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Much Ado About Rebranding: Beyond the Surface By Edukpe Ehimiaghe Nation branding is not destination, branding or marketing strategy; and it’s most emphatically not just a logo. Rather all of these things are part and parcel of the totality of the nation brand, but they aren’t in themselves constitutive. In simple terms, your brand is what they say about you when you’re not in the room. Sayyid Faisal Al Said. Head, Oman Brand. In the face of the ongoing rebrand campaign, the challenge Nigeria is faced with today could undoubtedly make a lot of Nigerians within and outside doubt the integrity of the government by not keeping promises made to her people in the past. Unfortunately in the part we grow up in Nigeria, there is popular saying that you can only take a woman to the shade of the cocoa plantation to make love to her once but any other time you lead her same way, she automatically knows what your plan is. However, in the case of the Nigerian people, they have been led this same way several times and fell victim. Interestingly, the attitude of Nigerians is that of a people who have been kept by hope that someday things will get better. This is why the international observers have repeatedly said that Nigerians are very unusual people, very relentless in their search for fulfillment and would never give up regardless the challenge. Nigerians live with passion and the jocundity of living can never be taking away from them. I caught the Professor in the Information and Communications Ministry, Dora on the network news saying something that readily caught my attention why the rebrand train travelled to Akwa-Ibom State for another face of the campaign that there is this popular saying that there is no free lunch anywhere but she demurred that it was not true of Nigeria, stating that the only place free lunch is readily available is Nigeria even if this could not be said of other nations. She cited the example of Nigerian families who would be about to eat and visitors come in that the head of the family or the mother as the case may be would give the meal of her family to the visitors. She opined that that is never possible in the foreign land. How will you pay a visit to a white man and will give the portion of his family to a visitor; that will be dumbest or craziest thing to do, when after all he did not give you an invite for lunch. You even dare not ask for that. I think I share this thought and totally agree that Nigerians without any gainsaying are one of the most hospitable nation of the world. Our attitude to visitors and foreigners is forever warm. The reason why so many other black nationalities among us could pass freely as free born in the land with other Nigerians aware of where they are from, yet will harbour them. I really do not know of any such nation that will do that. Our history no doubt has reflected that our hospitable nature made the white man to penetrate us so well that they made a success of slave trading in some part of the country then. What are we trying to show case as it were? Nigeria rebrand campaign, irrespective of the negative leaning of a particular group in the society and in the Diasporas, Nigeria has so much to show the rest of the world in this time of her history in terms of culture – unity in diversity, taste elegance, passion for work within and most profoundly outside. In a recent training on strategic communication, some white folks who happened to be the resource persons cracked a joke that the Nigerians in Britain are the ones that get to the office first in the morning and leave last in the evening and the issue of no holiday for Nigerians was brought to the fore that Nigerians would rather work all the season to make more money than go on holidays. Nigerians are not known to be lazy in any respect. And on the issue of criminality, I had sometime read the research work of Segun Imohiosen on rebranding, citing the case of South Africa and the city of Johannesburg with her crime rate of a daily recording of over forty people killed in the city up till sometime in 2008 until Closed Circuit Television Cameras (CCTV) were installed in the city centres concealed to monitor crime and happenings. There are no such cases in Nigeria. In fact, no particular hot zone that the issue of one killed daily basis is recorded in any city of Nigeria except the issue of the Niger Delta Militancy which is rooted in the neglect and environmental degradation traceable to the oil exploration and exploitation activities in that region, which became quite pronounced in recent time. Interestingly, this spate, is already dying out in the face of the amnesty agreement with the people. Permit me to say that this can be seen in a not too direct mode that rebranding is already paying off as the attitude of the militants suddenly began to change in order to court peace. As such, rebranding has footage as it has quite a myriad positivity to show case even in the very short time. The rebranding project has witnessed tremendous support from the general public as a result of the outreach initiated by the Chief Rebrander, Akunyili. The outreach has presently seen her launch the campaign in different parts of the country to sensitize and buy the interest of the people in order to make the people understand in particular what rebranding seeks to achieve. The campaign has been held in the North East – Bauchi, and in the South East – Owerri, while the South West campaign has been launched in Akure and the South South in Akwa Ibom. It is noteworthy that Akunyili’s drive to see a rebranded Nigeria has made her train to travel to different sections of the public to hold talks and discussions to apprise them of the purpose of rebranding. The corporate Nigeria, Civil Society Organisations, Non-Governmental Organisations and various other interest and pressure groups in her effort to propagate and garner support for the rebranding message are those she had met and held talks with so far to through them reach the rest of the people who may not be reached directly. At the centre of all of this is the issue of attitudinal change which is the central focus of rebranding. And until the mindset of the people and perception is changed, the essence of rebranding may not get the desire result. So far so good, Akunyili is systematically combing the entire country in order to drive this message home. Concertedly, in the bid to get the campaign to all the nooks and crannies of the society and to achieve a lasting result within a very short space of time, the valued and core areas with a wider reach have been colonized by the campaign stratagem of Dora which are the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Diaspora), Nigerian Authors and Nollywood. These germane and critical sectors can help get the campaign to all reasonably. The fact remains that the Seven Point Agenda of Mr. President has so much to leverage on through the rebranding campaign.
Edukpe Ehimiaghe writes from Abuja |