News

Pythons don’t dance, crocodile can

never smile – Abati slams Nigerian
military over code-names

Published on

September 19, 2017

By

Ameh Comrade Godwin

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Reuben Abati, former spokesman to immediate past president, Goodlcuk Jonathan,
slammed the Nigerian military over its operation code names.

Abati said army’s operation code-names such as: Operation Python Dance,
Crocodile Smile were wrong because a python does not dance neither does a
crocodile smile.

In an article entitled, ‘Python Do Not Dance,’ the former presidential spokesman

noted that the Nigerian military has never been so clever in coming up with operation
code names.

He wrote, “Many of them are dead give-aways (Operation Lafiya Dole, Operation
Pulo Shield, Operation Maximum Safety, Operation Crackdown) or so stupidly
incongruous they evoke instant suspicion (Operation Python Dance, Operation
Crocodile Smile). Pythons don’t dance. Crocodiles don’t smile.

“Wars have been fought over the use of wrong codes; nations have been sabotaged
due to poor communication. Whoever came up with the code name – Operation
Python Dance- (sometimes a code name may be computer generated) may have
been aiming for irony, but it was strange irony given the facts of the situation and the
manner of operation. I make this point to argue that the Nigerian military has messed
up Operation Python Dance II in the South East conceptually and operationally, and
the attendant arrogance does not serve the Nigerian state well in my view.

“A dance is accompanied by music, it is celebratory in its kinetic and spatial

expressions, and it is probably one of the most ingenuous explorations of the human
frame. Accompanied usually by music and the symbolism of movement and flexibility,
a dance, vertical, horizontal or earth-bound is one of the wonders of human creativity
and the most universal of human languages.

“There is something called snake dance. It is of course celebratory. To say a python

is coming to a community to dance is a revelatory oxymoron. A python swallows, it
cuts off blood, constricts and suffocates, it is a pretentious animal that curls itself up
when it is ready to eat, and then strikes, employing the techniques of velocity,
ambush and surprise.

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“In December 2016, the pythons of the Nigerian military went to the South East on
Operation (I) but they did not blow their cover. They said they wanted to help reduce
crimes during Christmas. In September 2017, they blew their own cover, and
revealed the absurdity of their cryptonym. They did because they behaved exactly
like pythons. If that was meant as a covert operation to protect the sovereignty of the
country in the face of “seen and analysed threat levels” in the South East, the
Nigerian military got it terribly wrong. There is every reason for other military
authorities in the international community to laugh at Nigeria.

“The military admittedly can conduct routine exercises to prepare its men, to tune up
or to check out the country’s territorial integrity. Before and even shortly after the civil
war, Nigerian soldiers occasionally came out of their barracks and drove round the
town. They used to sing, march on the streets and dance inside their trucks and
wave at the people. The people waved back, and in due course, many children
mastered some of their songs. In our neck of the woods at the time, there is an
Alamala barracks in Abeokuta, one popular song was: J’amala n si ko, mo ti j’amala
ki n to lo s’ogun, j’amala n siko”.

“The latest instance is the bungled operation in Abia State. Operation Python Dance
II did not have to take place in the streets of Isiama Afara in Umuahia, Abia State,
close to Nnamdi Kanu’s father’s house. The public show of force could have been
done anywhere else in the South East. Strutting military force close to the home of
the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, who in the last year has been busy
mobilizing his people, and making demands on the Nigerian state is an undisguised
act of provocation with all the pythonic elements of invasion, surprise and suffocation.
It was the equivalent of the state descending to the level of rabble-rousing. This
happens when an institution like the military opts for street politics, and our military
certainly exposed itself in ways that called its professionalism to question in the last
few days.”