Buhari & Dele Momodu
Fellow Nigerians, I often wonder why an average Nigerian politician
is so squeamish.
They love and crave power but eventually prove too
timid to do the needful. The comfort power provides seems to be what
matters most to them, but, certainly not the pain it may attract. God
bless all those who fought for the democracy we seem to be bastardising
today. It is difficult to pick out the Obafemi Awolowos, the Sir Adesoji
Aderemis, the Nnamdi Azikiwes, the Anthony Enahoros, the Funmilayo
Ransome-Kutis, the Wole Soyinkas, the Aminu Kanos, Abubakar Rimis, the
Alfred Rewanes, the Waziri Ibrahims, the Fela Anikulapo-Kutis, Gani
Fawehinmis, the Moshood Abiolas, the Kudirat Abiolas, the Abraham
Adesanyas, the Alani Akinrinades, the Bola Tinubus, the Bolaji
Akinyemis, and such others in the crowd today. These were men and women
who were not afraid of tyrants and tyranny.
The reason for the poser on this page this week is simple and
straight-forward. I never imagined that a day would come, at this time
and age, when supposed democrats would voluntarily throw away their
freedom, like many of our leaders seem to be doing at the moment. Less
than two years to the next Presidential elections, only three aspirants
have demonstrated the guts to come out in the open to express their
ambition publicly, former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, Ekiti
State Governor, Dr Peter Ayodele Fayose and former Jigawa State
Governor, Alhaji Sule Lamido. The fourth person who has expressed his
intention privately to me is my friend and brother, Mr Alistair Soyode,
the Chairman of BEN Television, United Kingdom.
I really don’t care if they win or not but I salute their audacity
to challenge the status quo. You can never, and will never, win if you
don’t try first. There would have been no President Barack Obama or
President Donald Trump if they failed to throw their hats in the ring. I
know so many over-qualified Nigerians who want to contest but are being
bogged down by trepidation or abject fear. They only express their
dreams in hushed tones. I call them jelly, lily-livered beings. I feel
sad anytime I read in the newspapers about full-grown men abdicating
their God-given inalienable power to demi-gods with feet of clay.
Let me say categorically that Nigeria will never change unless we
change our style of doing things. How can we do the same things
repeatedly and expect the same failures to evaporate and vamoose? I’m
now convinced that we need our whizz-kids to step out and leap forward
to grab power as soon as possible. No one would say we have not been
patient enough. Our serial experiments have not yielded the desired
results. We had our fair share of coups. We fought a most atrocious
civil war. However, despite all this and when given the opportunity, we
choose to largely vote for the dregs of society above visibly talented
candidates. We have recycled leaders. Former Head of State, General
Olusegun Obasanjo departed in 1979 but resurrected in 1999. Now Major
General Muhammadu Buhari who was sacked in 1985 catapulted himself back
to power in 2015. Even President Ibrahim Babangida who stepped aside in
1993 attempted to sneak back in 2003 but President Obasanjo bullied him
into submission and he perished the thought without as much as a
whimper.
Recall, that the man who took over from President Obasanjo in 2007,
Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, who was already the Governor of Katsina
State, was the brother of Major General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, and his
emergence was to ostensibly compensate their family for the death of
Shehu in prison, under the Abacha regime. In short, it has been a relay
race by military Generals and their acolytes and cronies. I’m happy that
Buhari has fulfilled his own dream. I voluntarily supported him and owe
him my love and prayers till 2019 when that contract would expire. I
pray that God will grant him the wisdom to understand and appreciate the
treacherous nature of politics and politicians. I see how Governors are
falling over themselves to visit him and pay homage to HE who must be
obeyed and worshipped. I wish to admonish Baba not to believe this
monumental scam of the highest order.
If and when tomorrow comes, Baba will be stunned at how these same
latter day disciples will turn against him 360 degrees. I can place a
bet on that. Everyone is afraid today because of the palpable fear of
EFCC. No more. No politician wants to be roughened up for any reason.
Their strategy is to pretend like rattlesnakes and pounce on the prey
without warning. I foresee Buhari as one such quintessential prey. These
guys are not going to extend this regime of fear by another four years.
Buhari would have to go on a blistering offensive to come back to power
in 2019. I’m sure, he’s going to be cajoled into believing that he’s
the Messiah Nigerians have waited for all this while, until they pull
the rug from under his feet.
I remember one of Chief Moshood Abiola’s favourite wisecracks
“aponle ni ‘foreman’, enikan o le se ise eeyan merin” (the appellation
of Foreman is a mere exaggeration, no man can do the job of four men).
There is a limit to what Buhari can achieve in less than two years to
come because time flies at supersonic speed. By this time next year, he
must be on the campaign trail if indeed he wants to return to power in
2019 and his Party has nominated him as candidate. Since politics is a
game of numbers, he would have to travel round Nigeria and plead for
votes. You can force people to support your tenure in power but you
can’t intimidate people to vote for you because you will never see the
minds of voters. According to a popular political song in the First
Republic, “boo roju mi, o rinu mi, demo ni mo wa…” (You may be able to
see my face but you can’t read my mind, I’m a member of Demo (National
Democratic Party) …]. Such is life.
The truth I want to tell today, as a major supporter of Buhari in
2015, is that his goodwill has weakened and waned drastically and
dramatically. Minus the favoured members of the inner caucus of this
government, things are no longer at ease within the ruling party. Is
there anything Baba can do to redeem himself, his party and floundering
government? Of course yes, I believe in miracles. He must listen to the
cries of the people. He should concentrate on building institutions
instead of pursuing handpicked individuals. He should unleash the
talents that abound in every part of Nigeria instead of seeking to
please any section. It is always better to be a national hero than a
local champion. Nigeria is too divided at the moment and this is not
good for national development. I still have faith in Baba’s ability to
do the best for this country. It is clear to me that this is the legacy
that he wants to leave behind albeit that this has not yet been
achieved.
The government must be restructured before Nigeria itself can be
restructured. The recent mess in NNPC was as a result of excessive and
unnecessary officialdom and bureaucracy. The President need not be the
Minister of Petroleum. The functions of the Minister of State in
relation to the Board of NNPC should be clearly delineated if at all
there is any role for him. Such ridiculous overlaps we recently saw
should never have happened. We should stop over-concentrating power in
one man. It has been said that “absolute power corrupts absolutely…”
Ministers must be allowed to do their constitutional duty, in
accordance with the provisions of section 148 of the 1999 Constitution,
of meeting regularly with the President and the Vice President to (i)
determine the general direction of domestic and foreign policies of the
Government (ii) co-ordinate their respective activities in the discharge
of their executive responsibilities and (iii) advise the President
generally in discharge of his executive functions other than those
functions where he must be advised by other persons. The revelations
coming from the NNPC debacle where we now know that it is possible for a
Minister of State of a crucial ministry such as the Petroleum Resources
not to see the President for months on end should never be allowed to
happen. Regular meetings with Ministers and the Vice President as
envisaged by section 148 is not, cannot and should not be limited to the
weekly Federal Executive Council meetings. The regular meetings should
also include meetings with groups of Ministers and even individual
Ministers. That is surely the intendment of the Constitution. As it is
with the Federal Government, so it should be with the State Governments,
as similar provision for the States exists in section 193 of the 1999
Constitution. The corollary of this is that both at Federal and State
level Ministers and Commissioners must be appointed as early as possible
into the administration. The situation where President Buhari did not
nominate and appoint Ministers until more than 4 months into his
administration and Governor Rauf Aregbesola did even worse by waiting
almost 3 years to select his cabinet must never happen again.
The Civil and Public Service must become transparent and
accountable again. Civil and public servants are there to serve us as
their nomenclature indicates. They are not meant to be overlords
creating fiefdoms where the general populace become their serfs or even
worshippers in some cases. A truly restructured viable and vibrant civil
and public service is the lynchpin for a proper democratic, fair and
just society. It is insensitive and inappropriate for Government to
expect the best of these workers if they are not properly remunerated
not to mention, the present scenario, where even the ridiculous wages
that they are paid are paid many months in areas. It is the same
insensitivity that extends to the illogical policy of no work, no pay!
Imagine the chaos and calamity if the workers through the Nigerian
Labour Congress (NLC) also decided that there would be ‘No pay, no
work’! A properly structured government would be faced with no such
conundrum and the nation can only be better for it.
Courageous Nigerians must step forward and herald the much needed
change in governance. They do not have to wait on President Buhari’s
decision as to whether he will seek a second term or not before showing
their hand. They would be doing the nation a wealth of good if only what
they achieve is to provide stiff opposition to the President and an
opportunity for the people to truly use their votes. Otherwise, the
Nigerian public would simply have been short-changed and disenfranchised
as usual by the political class because again they would be limited in
their choice of candidates.
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By: Dele Momodu
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