Is Kogi State free of COVID-19? That would be great, given the common health threat coronavirus poses. But if it is, why subvert independent peer confirmation of that status, by aborting the federal COVID-19 support mission to the state?
That was the needless drama that came out of Nigeria’s “Confluence State”, the virtual heartbeat of Nigeria, sharing boundary with nine states (Nasarawa, Benue, Enugu, Anambra, Edo, Ondo, Ekiti, Kwara and Niger), aside from the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.
Kogi’s central geographical location is of great significance, in fighting COVID-19. If it bears heavy transit traffic from the surrounding states and FCT, and it is free of COVID-19, against these neighbouring areas grappling with cases of the virus, then there must be something Kogi is doing well that the whole country must learn from.
That should have logically compelled the independent confirmation of this golden status. If that had been, every part of Nigeria should, by now, have been looking towards Kogi for direction, in the fight to checkmate COVID-19.
But the way the federal mission virtually fled, on the pain of being locked up in an isolation centre, spoke of crass denial, wilful cover-up and a condemnable politicisation of a grave public health crisis, on which the whole country ought to be on the same page.
What Yahaya Bello, the Kogi State governor, hopes to achieve by that rascality is not clear. However, what is clear is it is gubernatorial rascality taken too far. Which is why the federal authorities, as well as the adjoining states should take a very serious view of the matter. Indeed, it would be well and truly tragic were it to dawn on all that the Kogi State drama was nothing but bluff and bluster, to screen off the true status of the state.
By that needless stonewalling, the governor could not only have put Kogites at incipient COVID-19 risk but denizens of the 10 accompanying states/FCT could also be in avoidable danger.
Still, members of the visiting mission deserve serious knocks for breaching the most basic of COVID-19 prevention protocols. It was shocking that a mission delegate could shake hands with Sunday Ayenibe, the state’s director of protocol, in the course of a microphone hand-over, when prohibition of handshake forms the most basic symbol of social distancing, so core to COVID-19 prevention efforts.
Without that handshake, the governor wouldn’t have been gifted the procedural technicality to send the mission scurrying, with a threat to quarantine the offending officials, in the Kogi State isolation centre. Would that be a set-up? If it was, why should there be an ambush, in a straightforward, open-and-close case of scaling up tests and facilities against a dire pandemic, to protect everyone?
Not a few have argued that the governor’s action might have been covered by the federal doctrine, since the state must buy into whatever the central authorities propose, before they take effect in host states. That is true, particularly in a polity where the central authorities had become notorious for trampling on states’ rights.
Even then, a health crisis period is lousy time to push that right. It again suggests strong elements of bad faith, which should not really arise at this perilous time, when everyone ought to be the other’s keeper against COVID-19; and both the federal and state governments should be driven by a common goal.
Despite all the drama, however, the conciliatory tone the federal health authorities has been most reassuring. “We tried to send a team of the ministry of health and the NCDC into Kogi State yesterday but there were some differences there as to processes,” health minister, Dr. Osagie Ehanire, reported the following day, at the regular daily COVID-19 media briefing. “This will mean that we need to re-engage the state governor again and work with him and his to create the conditions under which the ministry of health and the NCDC can complete their job.”
That was well said. Now is the time for Governor Bello to cooperate and collaborate, so that the country can provide a common front to keep Nigerians safe from coronavirus. This is no time to push rogue federalism, rippling with bad faith.
Credit: The Nation
