By: Mohammed Ndarani Mohammed, SAN. Hukuncin Nupe, Hukuncin Kasar Hausa and Madugun Lapai.
Criticism can come easily to us humans. We often find it a simple thing to dissect something said or done by someone else, and a lot of us take great delight in doing this.
There is a profound difference between legitimate criticism and reckless character assassination; between holding a public figure accountable and embarking on a campaign of calumny designed to destroy the reputation one has built over years.
But one thing people generally lose sight of is that it is way easier to be critical than to be correct.
And in the process of doing this we end up doing incalculable damage to a person’s reputation.
Whether this is done deliberately or simply with ‘I don’t-care-attitude’, the effect could do incalculable damage to a reputation that may have taken years to build and nurture.
When criticism abandons facts and evidence and becomes a theatre of personal abuse, the result is not accountability but degradation.
Recently Ambassador Mohammed Salihu Maiyaki gave a decidedly unflattering assessment of Professor Mohammad Yahaya Kuta, which to a lot of discerning minds would appear rather unfortunate, and could provoke the question; where is that coming from?
Prof. Kuta is a public figure who has been shaped by scholarship, professional accomplishment, public service, and intellectual engagement.
One of the defining characteristics of valuable individuals is their dedication to a cause they believe in and their commitment to grinding out results, regardless of the challenges they face.
Successfully facing challenges is a commendable trait in humans and such result-oriented people carry this characteristic into everything they do.
Usually, too, they do this from a truly altruistic mindset, they do what they do for the greater good of humanity.
Prof. Kuta is a gentleman, and an erudite academic who has displayed commendable foresight and has generally thrown himself into robust academic engagement, always for the general good.
Prof. Kuta, is the Pro-Chancellor of Abdulkadir Kure University, Minna and also the Magatakarda of Nupe Emirate (the Chief Scribe of the Nupe Nation). Regardless of one’s personal disposition toward him, his reputation and contributions deserve to be discussed with civility, evidence, and intellectual honesty.
For public figures like him, evidence of their works and character do not lurk in an unending circle of verbal validation of their quality but is demonstrated in the successful outcomes of the projects they have ever handled.
To substitute reasoned argument with innuendos and character attacks is not a demonstration of courage or strength; rather, it is an admission of the poverty of one’s argument.
Maiyaki’s near diatribe against the highly and vastly respected professor Kuta is just an unfortunate attempt to make a good man look small.
A person who chooses to attack the character of another person must understand that words have consequences, therefore, there should be corresponding responsibility to exercise restraint, fairness, and intellectual discipline.
Why character assassination: rather than engaging with a person’s ideas, achievements, or public record.
Every public intellectual is subject to scrutiny or assessment but that must be guided by responsibility and not to deliberately distort the reputation of another human being.
If Maiyaki has a substantive assessment against Prof. Kuta, let him present verifiable facts and credible evidence.
Prof. Kuta and other public figures should be judged by evidence, facts, and records and not by emotional assessment.
Prof. Kuta is not only a promoter of peace and unity but has dedicated most of his socio-economic programmes and projects to the upliftment and emancipation of his people and Nigeria at large.
Kuta was among other things, former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Chief of Staff, Commissioner in the Ministries of Information; Agriculture with concurrent responsibility for Tertiary Education. He was the Chairman, Forum of Secretaries to Nineteen State Governments, Coordinated the establishment of Sir Ahmadu Bello Memorial Foundation, Northern States Committee on Reconciliation, Healing & Security between that produced the blueprint for the mitigation of Boko Haram Insurgency and other security issues in the North.
He also coordinated the Northern States’ Governors’ Forum [NSGF] also coordinated the United States Institute for Peace [USIP] Symposium held in Washington DC in 2014. He was a recipient of the Council for the Development of Social Research in Africa [CODESRIA], was awarded MacAthur Foundation Grant for the Fund for Leadership Development Programme. He was honoured as one of the 2000 Outstanding Intellectuals of the 21 Century by the International Biographical Centre, Cambridge, England, etc.
I, therefore, warn those who attempt to destroy the reputation of others through irresponsible speeches to remember that character assassination is ultimately a double-edged sword. In trying to diminish another person, the attacker may inadvertently reveal his own limitations, motivations, and intellectual deficiencies. Public respect is not earned through sensationalism. It is earned through integrity, competence, discipline, and meaningful contribution to society.
Let it therefore be made abundantly clear: criticism is legitimate, but character assassination is unacceptable. Deliberate humiliation is not acceptable. Accountability is necessary, but reckless vilification serves no constructive purpose.
