Between HIV and Mallam Nuhu RibaduByClarius Ugwuoha
In
Nigeria, a typical developing country where spread of
HIV is catalyzed by ignorance, it is our imperative role to
sensitize people on the dangerous and incurable phenomenon.
HIV/AIDS first identified in the United States in the 1980s has since hit epidemic levels depleting world population in geometric proportion; and long after it has been confirmed to exist in the continent, information about HIV/AIDS is still received with mock skepticism, cold indifference and outright disbelief.
HIV once contacted invades the blood stream and through the years
ravages and devastates the body leaving a skeletal residue. Some people
would readily confess to having not seen anyone thus afflicted and by
fallacious deductions ‘prove’ that
HIV or the
AIDS that results from it was only a white man’s affair. Such
rat-reasoning processes in otherwise mentally fit human beings in a
twenty first century world call for concern.
The fact is that so much media drive, so
much government and NGO efforts, have fallen short of desired grassroots
penetration. The result is ignorance of even basic facts taken for
granted; and risk behaviors. Bloody street brawls involving exchange of
body fluids are commonplace; the patronage of street side manicures and
pedicures with unsterilized equipment continues unabated, in fact
assuming a social relevance all its own. We are not to concern ourselves
with more apparent contraventions like unsafe sex and others.
The problem of grassroots apathy is
further compounded by the absence of reliable health statistics
highlighting the prevalence of the HIV infection in the country. Where
statistics exist, the figures are hair-raising. According to recent
reports, about one infection per minute is said to occur daily across
the nation.
A critical appraisal of the situation
definitely raises the alarming questions:
*How many unregistered deaths in the
outback villages, routinely ascribed to witchcraft and related phenomena
are the direct consequences of HIV/AIDS?
*In the absence of reliable statistics,
how many innocent carriers roam the streets and oblivious of it posing
potential dangers in various risk behaviours?
*With the hypothetical figure of one infection per minute across the nation, where does the actual figure lie and how alarming is it? The world woke up to claims of a panacea for HIV/AIDS by Nigerian-born immunologist, Dr. Jeremiah Abalaka. Conflicting newspaper reports about the veracity of that claim left the Nigerian literate public absolutely baffled. Dr. Abalaka, despite proven track record of professional competence as seen in his antecedents in medicine, disappeared in a maze of controversies, allegations of unethical conduct and outright professional artificiality. One would have expected that owing to its weightiness, Dr. Abalaka’s claim would have been subjected to rigorous medical scrutiny before those caustic salvos. The Nigerian medical world was acting the part of a prosecution witness against one of theirs, content with consigning Dr. Abalaka to the garbage bin of history. There was the inveterate disquiet that an African, a Nigerian for that matter, would demystify, of all medical scarecrows – the HIV. The unexpressed impression was loud, that it was un-African to excel or to do what has baffled the white world and their clinical laboratories. That was where Dr. Abalaka and his ilk erred, in ever aspiring to unmask mysteries taller than the laboratories of the first world. As HIV spreads surreptitiously in Nigeria, so are sister viruses incubating in their intravenous fortresses, catalyzed and spread by human vectors sometimes unaware of the presence in them, of these debilitating scourges.
Interpolating backwards to Dr. Abalaka,
the first impulse was that here was a medical expert not even a witch
doctor. Even President Jammeh of The Gambia with his herbal HIV therapy
is attracting greater mention and more benign curiosities than ever
allowed any claimant in
Nigeria. The posers are: what does HIV infection have in common
with our policy drive as a nation? What is common to Dr. Jeremiah
Abalaka, Professor
Charles Soludo, and Mallam Nuhu Ribadu?
The problems in our polity with its
catalysis, of hate, corruption, insincerity and dishonesty, seem
insurmountable like the Human Immuno-deficiency virus. Dr. Abalaka,
Professor Soludo and Mallam Ribadu are forces of positive change being
sabotaged by fifth columnists in the system.
Recently Mallam Mohammadu Nuhu Ribadu of
the EFCC has come under scathing public searchlight because he dared to
unmask some of the mysteries of the Economic Immunodeficiency Virus (EIV)
long diagnosed in our polity without cure. Before we blunt our vision
with jargons like ‘due process’ and ‘rule of law’, it is important to
note that grassroots impact of the activities of the EFCC is phenomenal.
What do you expect after this detoxification process is shunted
surreptitiously aside aided by due procedural conscience? With
some ex-governors like Sir Peter Odili instituting court cases to stall
their prosecution by EFCC, more remains to be seen in the war against
the deadly economic cum corruption virus. The mere appearance at court
to stop probe carries gravely ominous connotations. The right course of
action would have been for an ex-governor with public fingers pointing
in his direction, to open himself up to public scrutiny, declare his
assets even if not publicly and invite –yes invite – the doubting public
to point fingers in any given direction. It is only when we have
achieved this level of probity and transparency that due process and
rule of law will make more meaning.
Shot to pieces with arrows from the same
bow of due process was the naira redenomination programme of Professor
Charles Chukwuma Soludo. Overnight, roadside mechanics and hairdressers
became economic commentators, hauling salvos at an exercise earmarked
for economic redirection. President Umaru Yar’ Adua would do better if
he allows the various parastatals some latitude and sphere of autonomy
and not traumatizing them to the supervision of the Attorney General and
Justice Minister. In the long run the president is fully responsible for
the shortcomings of his subordinates. There can be no trading blames.
Chief Clarius Ugwuoha writes from
the Ezeali Palace in Egbema.
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