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Ikhariale's pseudo intellectualism By MIKE Ikhariale’s rejoinder in the Vanguard of Friday May 10, 2002 to my article titled. “In defence of
the Ota endorsement” and published in the Guardian on April 24, 2002 made an interesting reading. But, I dare say, with all sense of responsibility, that the
rejoinder failed woefully in its attempt to fault my article, and has done nothing to advance the course of knowledge or intellectualism. It only, in my view,
displayed a high degree of subjectivism.
Most painfully, it failed to deal with the substance of the article, but rather, in what obviously amounted to follow-the-pack mentality, which
does not add value to intellectualism or society, began to attack my personality and my publication - Nigeria’s Oil and Gas Monthly. Said Ikhariale: “His (my)
purported defence of the move (Ota visit) was plainly preposterous and a seminal lesson in communal depravity. If the publisher of the Oil and Gas Monthly, a
sub-industry pamphlet that survives solely on government patronage delivered in the form of vain and repetitive and needless self-congratulatory advertorials, has
limited himself to the fact that he, as a citizen, does wholly support the Ota circus, one would have been prepared to concede to him his freedom of speech.”
Unfortunately, this is pure ignorance and Ikhariale is passing off his ignorance as truth to an unsuspecting public. Let me state here that I refuse to be drawn
into any mud-slinging with Ikhariale. The painful reality is that Ikhariale left the substance and started attacking my person and our publication, which, I suspect,
he knows very little or nothing about. Otherwise, he would never have described it as a pamphlet or that it survives on government patronage.
The name of our publication is: “Nigeria’s Oil and Gas Monthly” not “Oil and Gas Monthly” as he chose to call it. This magazine has
been published since 1991, that is over 10 years. And over those years it has never published any congratulatory advert or advertorial from any government or
government parastatal nor carried a message or messages congratulating any head of state, high ranking government official or any person, for that matter. So, our
magazine obviously couldn’t have been surviving on government patronage. This fact can be verified from the public record, that is the National Library which is the
custodian of all publications in Nigerian.
His reference to our magazine as a “pamphlet”, has shown one of two things: It is either he has never seen a copy of our publication or he does not really understand the true meaning of the English word “pamphlet”: Whichever one of these is the truth, it is important to let the teacher know that “Nigeria’s Oil and Gas Monthly” is an authoritative, quality publication which circulates locally and abroad, and is read by informed oil industry operators who regard it highly. It is indeed the ultimate in petroleum trends monitoring. If Ikhariale thinks these are mere claims, let him, please, do a check within the Nigerian oil industry. For his education, however, we volunteer to send him a copy of the publication for his perusal, but, we, first, have to warn that this publication is a technical one, reporting on a highly technical and dynamic industry. As for me, there is nothing that I want from this government and /or the next that I do not already have, that is by the Grace of our Lord. One other reason why Ikhariale’s heckles became an issue for me was his accusing me of going beyond democratic parameter (whatever this means) “to unfairly insult the Nigerian Press” and his reference to my article as an attempt to “put into circulation some unpardonable heresies about the subject matter of the system of endorsement...” I will take them in that order.
First, I am an active participant in the Nigerian Press. As the publisher of Nigeria’s Oil and Gas Monthly, I work, on a daily basis,
with a crop of young and highly intelligent Nigerian journalists, who I have the utmost confidence in and give their due professional respect.
Secondly, I am an active member of the Newspapers Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN) for some years now. I was actively involved in the
last electoral process that produced Mr. Ray Ekpu as president of NPAN. So, who is this Ikhariale and who made him defender of the Nigerian Press? It needs to be
stated categorically that the Nigerian Press can adequately defend itself without his help. In the circumstances, Ikhariale has only succeeded in posing himself as a
pseudo-intellectual.
And for avoidance of doubt, I would prove this charge of pseudo-intellectualism against Ikhariale, who is reportedly a law lecturer at a
Nigerian university.
One, he claimed the examples cited in my article in support of the fact that endorsement is an integral part of democracy were faulty, “if
they (my examples) were done (cited he must have meant) in a history class, that would have earned him (me) a huge zero.” But unfortunately, Ikhariale, the lecturer,
failed to prove how. He failed to support his claim by providing what he considers the right answers. So, the reader does not benefit from his wealth of
intellectual experience.
Further, Ikhariale appoints himself the task of performing, and I quote him: “(a) deconstruct (of) the fundamentals of his (my) heretical
submissions with a view to exposing the motives and perhaps, justification for his (my) rather robust but defective intervention in this all-important issue...”
Ikhariale’s purported “deconstruct” obviously cannot hold any water. The deconstruct he ends up with is that “you don’t beg anyone to exercise what is his
constitutional right to do.” Good. But, is that an intellectually sound deconstruct? Is it a deconstruct at all? Perhaps, Ikhariale needs to be re-educated - that
‘to urge’, which is what endorsement connotes, is not necessarily the same as ‘to beg’. And no where in my article did I refer to the Ota event as “begging”. In my
view, and it bears restating, what happened at Ota was an endorsement, loyal party men urging the President to re-contest and assuring that they would back him. And
in fact, as we now know, some of those at Ota wanted the President to declare his stand so that the necessary political alignment and realignment could take place in
good time before the campaign period begins, not because if the President does not re-contest they would die!
Ikhariale describes the Ota episode as “a crude invitation of the ordeal Abacha put us through”. Again, he appears not to fully understand the
difference between what happened during the Abacha era and now. The former was somebody who got into power through the barrel of a smoking gun, and rather than
announce a proper and ethical transition, was seeking to succeed himself. If Ikhariale had checked his history, particularly the British history of the Cromwell era,
he would have seen some parallels here.
Ikhariale says that the “motives and objectives” of these same political harlots that went to beg Abacha “are well known”. Unfortunately,
Ikhariale did not tell us what these motives and objectives are. Another evidence of Ikhariale’s pseudo-intellectualism. Yes, I agree with Ikhariale when he says
the Nigerian Press boldly discharged its duties during Abacha’s era. What he does not know is that the journalists were not the only heroes of that time, neither
were the Nigerian human rights activists and NADECO politicians who fled the country to campaign outside against the bestial regime. What of the teenage school boys
and girls who were martyred on Ikorodu Road, Lagos, by Abacha’s henchmen for protesting the annulment of June 12? What of the civil servants that were
unceremoniously dismissed by the junta in an ethnic cleansing exercise, for being from the ‘wrong’ part of the country? What of those whose businesses and families
were destroyed for the same reasons? What of those who, at the risk of their lives, worked right in the heart of Aso Rock to subvert the despot by giving vital
information to the Nigerian Press?
Ikhariale claims: “Anyone can be rented, it is only the price that would vary.” How wrong can Ikhariale get? It is not everyone that has a
price in this context. This is a clever-by-half pseudo-intellectual extrapolation by Ikhariale. So, the price is right and who is sponsoring Ikhariale?
Further, Ikhariale says that I “wrongly compared a hallowed culture overseas to a very corrupt scheme at home”. How childish can Ikhariale
get? Is the system of democracy the same in the US, Britain and France? Even just across the English channel, French democracy, that is, its presidential system, is
different from that of Britain, which is a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary system, and equally different from the US presidential system. Yet, these are
all time-honoured systems of democracy.
Ikhariale says “endorsement” has meaning only if it is to support a decision already made. Wrong again! Lawyer Ikhariale has no authority -
political, constitutional, or legal, to back this up. Yet, he finds it convenient to pass off his personal views as facts. As cited in my various examples - Tory
party for Thatcher in the early 80s; Clinton’s endorsement et la, an endorsement in the political and democratic context, can come before or after a formal decision
or declaration has been made.
In order to bring home the main issue of my discourse to the public arena again, an issue which Ikhariale failed to understand and/or refuse to
see because it was not so obvious, I wish to quote this section of my article for the benefit of those who might not have read it: “Given their military era hangover,
the fledgling journalists appear to read so much meaning, how be it, a negative one, into endorsement. All Obasanjo’s recent endorsement at Ota shows is that the
leading lights of his party are behind him for 2003. Even with the Peoples Democractic Party (PDP) nomination under his belt, candidate Obasanjo still has to contend
with formidable opposition from the Alliance for Democracy (AD) and All Peoples Party (APP). Already, a strong candidate has emerged from the APP, in the person of
ex-military head of state, General Muhammad Buhari. By any standard, Buhari would not be a push over. For the AD, Obasanjo’s old foe, Olu Falae, is also consulting
prior to having another shot at the presidency. So, how can an Ota endorsement equate with Abacha’s diabolic plan to succeed himself? No way. Such comparisons are
ill-informed, wicked, and mischievous. Rather, it was Abacha that was trying to desecrate time honoured democratic traditions to achieve his demonic aim”.
Sadly, Ikhariale could not understand this , and has no authority to back up all his postulations on what he calls the “conceptual” framework
of endorsement. For all intents and purposes, Ikhariale’s rejoinder was a piece of pseudo-intellectualism. June 2002
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