Anonymous letter triggers government attention about non-payment of allowances
A lot has been seen and written and otherwise documented about the power of the social media for social and political engineering. But recently we were blindsided by an input from the military. An anonymous entry for that matter.
It was a letter from an unknown soldier via the social media to the president, Muhammadu Buhari. The letter was written with knowledge and compassion about the plight of soldiers duelling for our safety not only in the northeast but also the rest of the country.
But for a few rhetorical stumbles, it is well-written and mature. The letter will mark a new template in the way persons not only in government but also in the military can convey serious messages to authority without deleterious consequences to the person. This is unlike the whistle-blowing culture that is ultimately self-serving because of the possibility of pecuniary reward.
Here is the letter from the anonymous soldier who is a private of the Nigerian Army in Yobe: “Your Excellency, this is the third month in a row that we have been denied of our operational allowances. We have to rely on our meagre salary for everything. From battalion commanders to sector leaders, we are all in debt, because our salaries are not enough to sustain us at the battlefield, let alone feeding our families back at home.”
The president has not acknowledged the letter. Neither has any of his aides reacted to it. Even the army has not directly acknowledged it. When confronted with the facts of the letter, the Director, Army Public Relations, Brig-Gen. Sani Usman did not flesh out any details of the official attitude to the epistolary accusations. He allegedly reacted with a terse “I will react.”
For the beauty of democracy, it will make a lot of sense to hear the president react to the letter. Or even his aides. After all, it was the intervention of the president that changed the course of the war against the militant sect Boko Haram. So, when a soldier in the heat of conflict conveys such sentiments with such a letter, the president should have expressed his humanity with a response the way he did with arms and reorganisation of the army in the northeast, especially in Borno State. The private who authored the letter is currently fighting as part of the Operation Lafiya Dole, the anti-insurgency force that has helped disable Boko Haram significantly in the northeast.
It is an irony that just as the letter became common knowledge, the army announced its decision to pay “allowances owed the troops for the last two months.” The private had written, however, that they were owed three months allowances.
The Chief of Army Staff, Lt-Gen. Tukur Buratai, confirmed that the soldiers had not received their allowances for months. He assured that they would enjoy maximum welfare as an acknowledgement that their “unflinching loyalty, perseverance and dedication to duty brought the desired success in the fight against terrorism, insurgency and other activities.”
In the statement, the army spokesman, Usman, said among other things, “the COAS has assured troops, especially those on Operation Lafiya Dole of their welfare. This is coming from the good news of the release of funds for the payment of operational allowances and logistics for the third quarter of 2017 from the Ministry of Defence.”
The letter shows that the stiff and suffocating hierarchy of governments, army and even corporate world can be subverted with the infrastructure of equality and unfettered access that the internet has bestowed on the 21st century society.
The private, if he or she, had written a letter, the officers might have traced the handwriting. If that failed, they could trace its footprints within the army. But the internet has foreclosed such vulnerability. If he or she had conveyed it with the word of mouth, such a staff would also be marked and alienated and even set up as a sort of renegade or upstart in the force. The internet provided an outlet for sublime disobedience.
It is still curious that the army released its decision to pay the staff after the letter. Such letters in the past might not have seen the light of the public eye and could have been shoveled away in a heap of forgotten files.
We are also baffled that the men and women that are keeping us safe could be deprived of their dues. Again, they have had to rely on their “meagre” salaries to care for their battlefield needs while their families are left in the lurch. The families are not sure of their safety in the first place. To keep them out of their basic livelihood is more than a little callous.
We expect that such letters of anonymous origin will continue to pour in not only to inform us of negligence but also to trigger official response.
