Mr President, Please talk to us!
government’s side of the story will treat the response as an afterthought and doubt its credibility. Unfortunately, people tend not to believe the police when, after killing a citizen, they say “We came under heavy fire from some unknown hoodlums and returned fire for fire, following which one of them died.”
The lack of faith in what government says is worse in pre-election periods. People tend not to believe government’s claimed achievements, particularly when they are hearing about them for the first time in the run up to elections. The damage is worse when government spokespersons use fake images of projects in other countries, culled from the internet, and claim they are projects executed by government in Nigeria. When the people feel that they cannot trust their government, there is a serious problem. It makes it much more difficult to demand patriotism and personal sacrifice of the citizen.
The communication architecture of the Federal Government is fragmented and lacking in cohesion. The current President does not engage enough with citizens. For some reason, he seems to be more at home talking to the international press while he is out of the country than engaging with the local press or directly with citizens. Interactions with citizens are carefully scripted and it appears that every effort is made to avoid live interactions. Therefore, any human, humorous and compassionate side that the President may have is invisible to the public.
We have a Ministry of Information whose job appears to be to dish out unidirectional government propaganda, with little or no effort to listen to citizens or actively engage them. The name of the Ministry itself is indicative of its approach. The agencies and parastatals under the Ministry, such as the Nigeria Television Authority and the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, adopt the same approach of simply eulogising government. Quite often, what they announce as their news headlines are completely at odds with the hot topics being discussed by citizens, nationally and internationally, particularly when the news does not favour government.