By Terrence Kuanum
It simmers with deep pines into the heart to devote time to respond to a Boko Haram and Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP) terrorists’ empathizer and spy proxy Yushau A. Shuaib. In a so-called open epistle to President Muhammadu Buhari, where he dragged and impugned the brilliant service records of Nigeria’s incumbent Service Chiefs, with his beguiled vituperations, invokes the whines of a pathetic loser in a game he initiated and defined its rules.
The first demoralizing twinge is to accurately fix the true identity of Yushau A. Shuaib in the context of sane people or anyone who qualifies for decent association or rumination over his thoughts. His veiled identity is more frightful than his flaunted public persona or image as the founder of PR Nigeria (an online publication). One could easily mistake Shuaib for a journalist. But the confusion is doubled when he dabbles into partisan issues and spanks mercenary or personal perceptions on matters in a journalistic style.
So, Shuaib is only a quack reporter! He is just a wonderboy and crony to his terrorists’ honchos. They have conscripted and assigned him to deploy his pen to up the ante in campaigns for the ouster of the current Service Chiefs which Boko Haram and ISWAP terrorists have found impenetrable. That’s how he abuses the profession he professes. He is susceptible to the abuse of self on everything.
Shuaib and co-travellers are angling at the behest of terrorists for a pliant batch of Service Chiefs, terrorists could whimsically manipulate in nerve-wracking Nigeria more gravely as done in the past. It was the times Shuaib acted as consultant to the scandalous arms deal diversion initiator, former National Security Adviser (NSA) Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd) who is still standing trial for corruption and money laundering.
Col Sambo Dasuki’s recent release from jail for guzzling billions of dollars budgeted for arms procurement to battle Boko Haram terrorism in the Northeast has given partners like Shuaib the impetus to stage out again. But the unassailable truth about Shuaib is that he is a tireless pen hireling for terrorists, a sympathizer of Boko Haram and a masked minion for terrorists’ lords in Nigeria.
The PR Nigeria publisher claims to know everything, yet knows nothing in reality. He is only known as a betrayer of Nigeria, a consultant to Dasuki and all the past Service Chiefs before this set of Service Chiefs.
When he scored the shots and also sucked from the fruits of festering Boko Haram terrorism under a failed crop of Service Chiefs who apparently either communed with terrorists or were simply helpless, Shuaib regaled in the feast. He probably could not remember to pencil down open mails to the then President to change his Service Chiefs even with puerile arguments ‘as adduced now.
Unfortunately, today, he vibrates with sanctimonious righteousness’ in memos to President Muhammadu Buhari or appeals to present Security Chiefs to voluntarily retire from office on account of Run-Out Dates (ROD). At the same time, he blends his concealed motives by bemoaning an awful, imaginary, and overwhelming strikes of terrorists against military formations and civilian populations in 2019.
Assuming Nigeria is a country where people are inured by good conscience to accept blames or offer a public apology for detestable and subversive acts against their nation, fellas like Shuaib should be somewhere in a cathedral in penitence and praying all day for the forgiveness of his sins. He was one of the cosmetic surgeons acting on directives wittingly misinformed Nigerians that only three persons were killed on April 14, 2014, Nyanya bomb blasts.
The intention was to deliberately downplay the casualty figures; whereas not less than 200-300 persons were burned to death in the Boko Haram bomb explosions incident. Whose interests was Shuaib protecting at the time? Nigerians or his government bosses who aligned with terrorists? He is famed for such fakeness.
Unconscionably, he is now less concerned with the other previous years the current Service Chiefs harvested Boko Haram terrorists aplenty like a fishnet; reclaimed conquered Nigerian territories, and freed thousands upon thousands of Boko Haram hostages held in secret gulags. His mind is obstinately not pricked to the performances of the current Service Chiefs ingenuity even with the additional variant of terrorism to Boko Haram as reflected by ISWAP terrorists.
And infatuated by an influence which only answers to the god of monies paid him by terrorists’ emperors for mercantile jobs, with stern instructions to adhere strictly to directives, he disgracefully shadowed in his hazy arguments on the removal or voluntary retirement of current Security Chiefs. So, he amplifies media campaigns for terrorists and the banned Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), staging it out on many dimensions. He seems to challenge the powers of the President to extend tenures of Service Chiefs but immediately recants himself sheepishly. He rigmaroles with fiendish, but frail strength and hackneyed tales to make a case for “stalled promotions” of senior Army officers, next to the current Service Chiefs.
In an astounding betrayal of himself, he lets out undertones which panders to an imaginary “abuse” of ethnic and religious configuration of the top hierarchy in the Nigerian Military and informally battles to outsmart prescriptions of destiny. He loudly wails for senior Military Generals blocked from attaining the peak of their careers as heads of various arms of the military because the current Service Chiefs have refused to quit the scene after RODs.
And he drops the bombshell persuasively in form of an appeal to Mr. President to sack the present Service Chiefs and anyone of whom could be made the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS). His words, “The President can even promote any one of the military chiefs to the position of Chief of Defence Staff since the current CDS has remained the most senior….” But where has he got the effrontery or expertise to determine to Mr. President who he appoints either as his CDS or Defence Minister?
Could it be merely because like he contended; President Buhari must align with the model applied in other countries; “…including Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad and the Niger Republic, such incidents usually necessitate the replacement of service chiefs under whose leadership there are repeat assaults and losses of lives of troops in the hands of terrorists.”
This oozes with the fragrance of idle talks and aimlessness. But has the change of Service Chiefs as argued by Shuaib terminate terrorism in such countries or must Nigeria operate its Armed forces on the template defined by other nations?”
It pulsates the mind perpetually and it stirs wonders to now believe Shuaib’s sermons in condemnation of present “worn-out” Service Chiefs and his subtle persuasion for the appointment of any one of them into a higher position. Is the position of the CDS not part of the current Service Chiefs he unfairly adjudged as failed? He evangelizes for their abrupt sack, but turns around to craftily seek the elevation of any one of them to fill the vacuum in the event of a shake-up? This is skewed logic and farcical in every sense. It betrays his bad ulterior motives prompting these campaigns. It is the undeniable mark of a betrayer.
Nigerians too, feel betrayed by some of their own citizens, just like President Buhari. By the origins and roots of Shuaib, he ought to be a patriotic compatriot, but not a friend to terrorists, by abusing the privilege of place of birth to promote internal and external interests of terrorists. It’s Shuaib’s worse betrayal of himself and his country. But neither President Buhari nor Nigerians have given a thought to the meaningless ranting of this chimp.
In life, it is expected. And there is consolation for the lethal swords of betrayers. The Holy scriptures consistently extrapolate even the intrinsically concealed virtues of man, which cannot never be known by facial contortions.
The Holy Scriptures says, “By their fruits, we shall know them.” And William Shakespeare dramatizes it better in Macbeth when he awoke the consciousness of the world to the stark reality of the duality in a man’s heart, as a complex intermix of instincts of betrayals and a heart stirred by true friendship. It’s embedded in every person, who manifest one aspect of it most times. So, Shuaib has not shocked anybody like Shakespeare’s King Duncan in Macbeth, after he heard tales from Malcolm on the execution of the Thane of Cawdor.
King Duncan was not shocked nor exuded emotions of disappointment, at messenger Malcolm’s confessions that the executed Cawdor confessed to his crimes against the King; was remorseful in repentance and pleaded for King Duncan’s forgiveness. But rather, the King expectantly wisecracked at the betrayal; “There’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face. He (Cawdor) was a gentleman on whom I built an absolute trust.”
There is no necessity in grinning or even frowning at President Buhari’s betrayers and enemies of Nigeria as portrayed by this insignificant propagandist, Shuaib. In decent climes, he is deemed no better than a wretched urchin, odious covert agent and sympathizer of terrorists.
The only notable value anyone can attach to his outlandish and puerile offensives to rejig the counter-terrorism narratives today in Nigeria is the personal demystification of his masked shadows of a quasi-terrorist, by his asinine twists of truths, amplifying cyberspace terrorism for his paymasters from foreign lands unwittingly, rendering clues for being on the payroll of Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorists to torment Nigerians and spread anguish.
But like President Buhari and Nigerians alike, no one feels perturbed by the double faces of souls like Yushau A. Shuaib and cahoots. The great Aristotle asked that “What is a friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies.” After all, Nicole Richie constantly thuds the sensibilities of men; “It’s hard to tell who has your back, from who has it long enough just to stab you in it….”
In essence, the covert games and antics played by the likes of Shuaib or their game planners have reserved shock -space in the cosmic and inherent experiences of men. What can anyone decipher from the nonsensical expletives as contained in an open epistle to Mr. President, laced in blackmailing fashion, but had its very opening words as “appeal” to Service Chiefs to voluntarily tender their retirement letters having exhausted their actual and renewed tenures?
The whole crux of the appeal, which reeks with deceptive connotations is to blur the evil intention of its motivation and then swerving to condensed lamentations of frustrations of foreign forces sponsoring terrorism in Nigeria. Shuaib’s cacophonies are all about the inability of Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorists to penetrate these Service chiefs with bribes or influence them with other niceties to relax the fierce and lethal fight-back of Nigerian troops in the frontlines in Northeast for terrorists to regain control of Nigerian territories.
Stupidity and idiocy have no limits nor respects dignity! If the intention of the writer is genuine and in good faith to persuade the Service Chiefs to voluntarily tender their letters of resignation, then what inhibitions restrained him from communicating his evilly lugubrious fixation on voluntary retirement directly to the personalities? It’s tough to decode Shuaib’s silly posturing and arguments.
Firstly, he concedes the lawful discretion of the President’s to retain the Service Chiefs, particularly if he has reason to trust in their patriotism and competencies on the assignment in war times like the current ones have abundantly established. And concurrently, Shuaib again repudiates himself by dropping the “appeal” initially meant for the Service Chiefs at the doorstep of President Buhari in stinking ululations served as in “the spirit of fairness, standard procedure and progression in the service, to allow the longest-serving service chiefs go after exceeding their run-out dates….”
This is idiotic and self-serving, revealing his extraordinary wicked intentions and passionately canonized beyond the surface. Why would he wail more than the bereaved on a matter completely estranged from his infantile and demurred considerations?
He lets out this piteous bile on substantive tenures or elongation for the Service Chiefs in vain justification. Shuaib relied on the revised Armed Forces of Nigeria Harmonized Terms and Conditions of Service (HTACOS) for officers. He must have felt excited and smart for “hitting the nail on its head. “But the efforts ended up stripping him naked and prostrate on his strongest points.
Belligerently and ignorantly citing Section 09.08 of HTACOS, the official service order in the military, he argued; “An officer appointed to the substantive appointment of the Chief of Defence Staff, Chief of Army Staff, Chief of Naval Staff and the Chief of Air Staff will hold the appointment for a continuous period of two years. The appointment could be extended for another two years from the date of expiration of the initial two-year period.”
And he released what he considered the big, but empty bang which mercilessly entrapped and pounded him. It laid bare his real oblique, long-winded intentions. His words; “The service chiefs were first appointed in July 2015 and their tenures were extended for an additional two years in 2017, which finally expired in 2019. It has always been the standard practice, since the return of democratic governance to Nigeria in 1999, for service chiefs to be in office for a maximum term of two years, except on a few occasions of discretionary extension by Mr. President….”
In ardently pushing this point, Shuaib dreaded mention of provisions of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria, which outlines in Section 218: (1) thus “The powers of the President as the Commissioner-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federation shall include power to determine the operational use of the armed forces of the Federation.”
And sub-section 218 :(3) states that “The President may, by directions in writing and subject to such conditions as he thinks fit, delegate to any member of the armed forces of the Federation his powers relating to the operational use of the Armed Forces of the Federation.” With these explicit provisions guaranteeing the Mr. President’s powers on tenure extension for Service Chiefs, what makes an infinitesimal Shuaib think his stroke of pen siding terrorists in Nigeria can vacate the powers?
Its complete gibberish to bandy simplistic viewpoints such as stumped by the writer that retaining the current Service Chiefs “…stagnates the careers of other senior officers and induces unfair early mature retirements, in the absence of vacancies at the topmost echelons of the services.”
For him, it is no longer service to the nation by career military personnel in taming terrorism, but the weight of his campaigns is centred on eyeing the zenith in service for senior officers alone, and not necessarily what they would offer to the liberation of the country from the claws of terrorists as if they are not part of counter-insurgency operations at different levels now? Its an attempt to incite members of the military and bolster mutiny, amplified by envy and jealousy of other officers. Only a devilish heart harbours and propagates such repugnant thoughts.
What does Shuaib know about military warfare and its nuances’? What is his experience in terrorism combat wars, anywhere in the world to stage out with such expert advice? It only informs of the extent his paymasters have pushed him to delve into the furnace of their evil agenda against Nigeria. But that’s the price of a mortgaged conscience. It wonders forlornly and dreads its shadows because of the invincible power of nemesis. Shuaib and his devil’s initiates both in Nigeria and abroad falters before it’s a destructive force with humiliating grovelling at the ninth hour.
Shuaib cannot deceptively trick Nigerians, whilst executing his discreet project in support and promotion of Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorists in Nigeria. He has only betrayed himself, as noted by one of the earliest English novelists Joseph Conrad, who said; “All a man can betray is his conscience.”
Let Shuaib rummage his conscience and truthfully tell Nigerians that it would have been different if his company, PR Nigeria still enjoys the same patronage under the current service Chiefs or why he never scripted an open letter with such venom when his bosses compliant with terrorists held sway in Nigeria and Boko Haram festered uncontrollably?
Had the present crop of Service Chiefs sustained the umbilical cord of evil and connived with him or kept him in their udder; then it would mean nothing to him whether the Dapchi girls were released or not; whether Nigeria is safe or not; or the United Nations (UN) complained or the European Union Parliament passed a resolution in January 2020 decrying spate of renewed terrorist attacks or the Global Terrorism Index of the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) has rated Nigeria third in terrorism prone countries.
But he should never mind as Nigerians are aware of his powerful blessings in mischief and no one can compete with him. But Shuaib cannot fool the President and Nigerians anymore.
Kuanum is a researcher in conflict resolution and peacebuilding expert.
