BARR. ADEGBITE IS CLINICAL! When General Muhammadu Buhari wins the February 14, 2015 General Elections, it must be on record that the incumbent, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan right from the outset, started out on a journey to make Buhari President come 2015. To start with, the emergence of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, as the 3rd Executive President of Nigeria under the 4th Republic, at the time it happened, was of some historical significance, particularly given the manner of his emergence, coupled with the circumstances of his roots. So remarkable was his emergence at that time that it became an enduring debate as to how rapidly a man could be so fast lifted from grass to grace, without so much as lending a hand in the entire process. As at the time he emerged Vice-President, it was in the midst of far more qualified men, all boasting towering and very intimidating credentials, yet he emerged. Not more than two years down the line, the Presidency was handed to him, even without even lifting a finger. Obviously, all of this should be a matter of deep reflection for anyone who has found himself in such a rare position, except that this, apparently never happened in the Jonathan Presidency, at least from events that were later to follow. Now I stand to be corrected, but I make these assertions with all sense of responsibility, and let me start from this standpoint. In the entire chain of transaction that saw to the emergence of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan as President, it must be said that he owes absolutely nothing to his party the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Thus, were he to be a man of deep reflection, he would have humbly come to the knowing that he owes everything to God Almighty and a few decent men of honour, that God raised at that very dark period of Nigeria’s political history, to ensure the mantle of leadership was not denied him. While Jonathan’s earlier emergence as Vice-President, was based purely on PDP’s age-long dirty political shenanigans, his later emergence as Acting President and subsequently substantive President was nothing but the power of God at work, through the instrumentality of resolute men of courage. It is still fresh and contemporary history, that while men like Ojo Madueke and Michael Andoakaa, were doing everything possible to foist a suntai-styled scenario on Nigeria, where an obviously incapacitated President would continue to rule by proxy, it was the courage of the few like the Pastor Tunde Bakare led Save Nigeria Group (SNG), Prof.Wole Soyinka and others, that frustrated and truncated the agenda of these enemies of Nigeria, who of course were all chieftains of the PDP, and ensued that Jonathan was not only sworn in, but he indeed became the Commander-in-Chief. One must not forget in a hurry, the sweat and tears of millions of Nigerians who took to the streets in Abuja, Lagos and Port-Harcourt, who were brutalized by Dambazzau’s Military boys but refused to be cowered, but insisted that Jonathan must be sworn in. If not for the notoriously short memory of these men in power, they would have realized that at those dark moments, a certain Edwin Clark was nowhere to be found, neither did anyone know of any individual that goes by the name Godswill Akpabio, nor did a certain man called Asari Dokubo lead any protest in the creeks that Jonathan must be sworn in. As a matter of fact, it was most of the progressive and revolutionary members of today’s All Progressives Congress (APC) that formed the bulk of those who risked their lives on the streets in those protests. In equal measure, no one knew that there existed anyone called Patience Jonathan to lead Nigerian Women and Widows, nor did anyone know of any Diezani Allison-Madueke speaking out somewhere. While the likes of Ngozi Oknojo-Iweala were in the cool comfort of their World Bank Office far away in the United States, it was the likes of the fearlessly brilliant Prof. Dora Akunyili, Abike Dabiri and Oby Ezekwesili, who stood out as lone voices in the wilderness and amazons to challenge the dirty power-play. In fact at a time, the then loyal Michael Anodoakaa, took to calling Prof. Dora Akunyili all manner of unprintable names, while all the other many cowards in the PDP, simply joined the political cabal to hold the country hostage. At the end of the day, it took the blood and sweat of millions of Nigerians from the length and breadth of the country, to return sanity to its rightful place. Now, I must say that not one of any of those who took part in those protests did so for any pecuniary reason, nor did any one of them know Dr. Goodluck Jonathan personally. As matter of fact, I very much doubt if about 95% of them had ever even heard him speak before so as to be able to gauge his charisma or competence for office. Rather, their passion was for Nigeria, for the good of their country, and for an expectation of the leadership they all desired. Sadly, that expectation has been insulted by incompetent leadership in the last Six years. Thus, immediately the President was sworn in, Nigeria began a journey to nowhere. In the first two years, many excuses were quickly given, with the President and his team claiming that not much can be done as it would be a time devoted to chasing away the then political cabal, only for the succeeding four years to see the return of the so-called cabal, and this time around, in many cases not in person, but through their wives, sons, daughters, or privies. All manner of characters were hurriedly again appointed as Minister for this and Minister for that, and the noise-making of the ruling party about their determination to rule Nigeria for the next one hundred years resumed. Suddenly, for a President who claimed never to have had a shoe, it was now time to commit a staggering One billion naira of tax-payers income, to feeding his Presidency annually. For the same President whose emergence was only possible by the hand of God, it was now time to unleash his South-south attack dogs on the rest of the country, with hitherto notorious riverine militants now becoming the President’s political town criers and giving them jobs through the multi-billion naira agency for the protection of pipelines in the creek, while many illiterate others remained paid for doing nothing through the amnesty programme, leaving millions of the country’s graduates to roam the streets jobless. The mess kept mounting, both home and abroad such that once again Nigerians became ashamed to speak of themselves as Nigerians anywhere in the world. As a matter of fact, it became so bad and shameful, that the most kindergarten of mistakes that should not even be associated with a Local government Chairman became the highpoint of the government. Now, I do not think, except if Doyin Okupe says so, that the man Buhari did cause, or procure any terrestrial or celestial force to push the President to record all of these mess that has brought his presidency to where it is, rather, the President in his ghastly move from one ignominy to the other, has succeeded in making Buhari, who all along remained nestled in the comfort of his Daura country home, a popular alternative and inadvertently making him President. Anyway, for the benefit of the remaining fans of the President, who are in any case are now but a microscopic few, let us descend to the arena of a contest of ideas and issues, and on this front, I will like to advance forensic arguments on Six (6) principal issues, which are not only issues of national interest, but which are now the major drivers of the skyrocketing momentum of Buhari’s wind of change. First is the issue of the economy. I feel this is a matter of res ipsa loquitor i.e. the facts speaking for itself. Everybody feels the bitter reality of today, all thanks to a wasteful and profligate government, that got carried away upon sighting stupendous wealth and free oil money in Abuja and kept spending on themselves and their cronies until they ran the country into ruins. As against the much advertised and merely academic rebasing of the Nigerian economy, which was trumpeted all over the place to nearly deafen Nigerians, recent events have revealed how much the economy has been shamelessly mismanaged in the last four years. All that it took to reveal the whole scam was the recent surge of dwindling Oil prices on the international market and the government’s hen came home to roost. It has now become so bad that a government that made billions of dollars in excess crude revenue courtesy of about 3 years of booming international oil revenue, a government that was left with about $45Billion External Reserve by the Obasanjo government that even increased to a whopping $67Billion under the Yar’adua government, a government that was left with another $ 25Billion in the excess crude account by the Obasanjo government, is so shockingly today unable to pay about 70,000 Civil servants on its payroll their salary since September, 2014. So what did our government do while the Oil boom lasted? Simple, the government, its friends, relatives, allies, contractors, and thugs simply descended into an extravagant lifestyle and prodigal spending, such that the Petroleum Minister was alleged of spending a whopping 10billion naira on chartered jets in just a year alone, while not forgetting the Stella Oduah scam, the Godsday Orubebe scandal, the seized twin arms cash in South Africa and so on. All the President’s Ministers kept junketing from country to country, carrying their girlfriends and concubines as official entourage. Everything became a grand bazaar and the assault on the struggling economy did not leave out the 419 National Conference and its delegates, who each pocketed a staggering 12million naira for sleeping and snoring at the talk-shop, and at the end of the day, 7Billion naira tax-payers money had gone down the drain. Only God know, if that 7Billion naira won’t have been enough to pay the salaries of those 70,000 Civil servants today. Immediately the oil money began to run out, this crop of undisciplined politicians quickly reduced their country to a beggarly nation, and the borrowing started. Starting from the $1Billion recently approving for borrowing to fight insurgency to another $5.7Billion being asked for to be borrowed to fund the 2015 budget, the borrowing game today continues. One recalls with freshness that during the 3 years Nigerian Civil War, this country did not borrow a dime. Rather, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, as the then Minister of Finance, deployed the most brilliant economic policies of that time to marshal the country through the war, acquitting himself brilliantly with homegrown economic policies, that later collapsed the Biafran currency and ended the war. What do we have today? Can anyone point to one ingenious policy that the current Minister of Finance, Dr.Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has deployed to rescue Nigeria out of all her economic woes? Second is the monster of corruption. Did I hear someone say we should not even go there? This has been the worst government in terms of the fight against corruption. Rather, this government and her ministers have made an open show of how much money can be embezzled, and simply waved off as ordinary stealing, as if stealing itself is no longer a crime under our laws. The final signal that gave this President away as a man lacking the needed manliness to face Nigeria’s number one problem of corruption, was when he crumbled under intense pressure from his South-south comrades and granted pardon to his former boss and a onetime UK fugitive, Chief Diepreye Alamieyeisegha and later reward him with a delegate’s ticket to the now infamous National Conference. Third is the issue of Education. It is a disgrace that the only achievement this government can lay claim to in the educational sector is their mantra of Almajiri schools. In a world ruled by 21st century first-class ideas and policies, what is the big deal about an almajiri school? And to show that this almajiri singsong is nothing but phantom project designed to hoodwink the people of the North for electoral votes, why did this same government not decisively address the issue of more than 10 million out of school children all over the country? Why did it not put in place sound policies to divest the control of primary education to the local and state governments who are better place to manage them? What business has a Federal government in sharing exercise books in primary schools, if not for politics? One must ask this same government boasting about Almajiri schools what it has done about the fate of the 102 rotten Unity Schools under its watch, that have now practically fallen apart? To take the matter further, one must ask with all seriousness what this government has done about University Education and increased funding. Of course, absolutely nothing! One must therefore ask this government, what sense is there in establishing nine more Universities with billions of naira, when the older ones are left to languish in infrastructural decay? And against all shred of moral decency, the President did not have a rethink when he was asked if one of the nine should be donated to his remote home-town of Otuoke. Quite saddening! One must again ask, how many years will it take one of this government’s newly established university, the Federal University of Oye for instance, to attain world class standard, with all the billions spent to establish it? If one is to be modest, one will say a hundred years perhaps, yet this is a school that does not have the capacity to admit more than 500 students at the moment. Now, if the same billions of naira spent in establishing this one University was committed to more funding for an institution like the University of Ibadan, will it not have a better result in terms of expanding the capacity of UI to admit more students than the meager 500 UNIOYE can only take and further better UI’s facilities and shore up her ranking amongst the best 100 Universities in Africa? If not sheer immoral and insensitive politics, why will a government that claims to know what it is doing, spend billions of naira on Universities that will not make any ranking as the best 10,000th University in the world anytime soon, when you have 5 Universities namely Obafemi Awolowo University, University of Lagos, University of Ilorin, University of Ibadan and University of Benin, who despite serious underfunding at the moment are still able to rank among the best 100 in Africa? Will a little more funding to these 5 Universities not have made more sense and help edge them closer being able to compete with their foreign counterpart? And to say that the reasoning to do this simply thing, is not even rocket science? Fourth on the list, is the reign of impunity in the country, as against the rule of law. It must be said that right from the word go, this government did not hide his disdain for the supremacy of extant laws. One would recall quickly, this government misadventure of trying to win popular sentiments to its side by rushing to rename the University of Lagos as Moshood Abiola Universty, only for the government to later eat its words. The Presidency then took their desperation to higher level by its desecration of the nation’s judiciary, through its ill-conceived suspension of the then President of the Court of Appeal, Hon.Justice Isa Ayo Salami, JCA, all in violation of the law. Despite the avalanche of wise counsel, the government continued to assault the rule of law by repeatedly appointing and reappointing subsequent Acting Presidents. Still in the gale of suspension, the Central Bank Governor was axed, with the Presidency arguing that he was disloyal to the President and couldn’t be fighting a government that employed him, as if the CBN Governor owes his loyalty to the President and not the nation. Not too far from that, the greatest assault on the Judiciary, which did not even dare happen when the Military was in power, happened under this government, when a man who was yet to be sworn in as Governor, led his thugs to a High Court Complex in Ado-Ekiti, and beat up a sitting Judge. Yet the President did not feel that abominable act had done incalculable damage to his Presidency. The list of these shameful acts remains endless. Are we to talk about the relentless assault on the Executive Governor of Rivers-State via one Police Officer called Joseph Mbu, the illegal grounding of the Governor’s aircraft, the desperate militarization of the Ekiti and Osun elections, the combined Adamawa, Nasarrawa and Ekiti impeachment fiascos, the recent violation of the sanctity of the House of Representatives Chamber an abusive use of the Police and the defence thereof by an obviously culpable Police leadership? In a rather shocking drama, it was under this Presidency that an Inspector General of Police became so drunk with political power, that he refused to recognize the Speaker of the House of Representatives in his official capacity, yet no consequences attended this thoughtlessness of his. Not even under the Shagari Presidency did his IG, Sunday Adewusi, in all of his partisanship took the politicization of the Police to this level, yet all that this Presidency could do was issue a statement, saying the President knew nothing about the invasion, as if a President who took an oath to defend the sanctity of his country’s constitution, is only meant to address violations of the law and rascally behaviours that he knows about. Anyway, one must quickly remind this particular IG of Police, that he should know that all of his being a good boy and doing his Oga at the top’s bidding, is only for a while. If he disagrees, he can quickly peruse the archives for what happened to some of his former superiors, in person of one AIG Raphael Ige who was also a loyal boy that led the kidnap of a then sitting Governor, Dr. Chris Ngige, and another Tafa Balogun who threw all caution to the wind in the kleptomaniac rigging of the 2003 General Election. Both once loyal errand boys, like today’s man Friday of the Presidency, have all been confined to the dustbin of history. Fifth is the matter of insecurity and one this matter, this is my simple submission. What is the use of a Commander-in-Chief, who only wears the Military garb in campaign posters of his transformation ambassadors, but runs away from visiting an ordinary village where more than 200 innocent girls have been abducted for close to a year? Anyway, how was that even supposed to happen, when for as long as 19 days after the abduction, a sitting President continued to disagree that his citizens were kidnapped, so much so that his long-list of official and unofficial spokespersons, quickly began a new narrative that it was the handiwork of members of the opposition, while the President’s wife too joined in the chorus, saying it was nothing but another attempt to embarrass her husband, as if the government itself had not all this while being a mere representation of embarrassments. Thousands of Nigerians have been killed, with scores maimed and displaced becoming refugees in their own country, yet on the day when more than 40 School boys were murdered in a Secondary School in Yobe state, the President who is supposed to be the Commander-in-chief, was somewhere in Abuja dancing at his Party’s second term declaration jamboree. Talk of a man whose children have just gone missing, going for a chieftaincy ceremony. Under this Presidency, government’s security agencies have become so ridiculed, all because of the desperation of the ruling party to win a non-existent, but cheap popularity contest against a fast rising opposition. What we know is that in saner climes, discreet intelligence agencies such as the Directorate of State Services (DSS), which is akin to the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), are known as Secret Service Agencies to be rarely seen or heard of, however, under this government the story has changed. For the first time in our country’s history, a once upon a time inconspicuous DSS, have been reduced to something you can call the President’s boys scout, showing up in every matter and intervening in every quarrel. So bad has it become that if the DSS is not seen wearing hoods on Election Day, they would be heard summoning striking NUPENG workers to a meeting or fighting with the Police that they too must prosecute and get some accolades. Sixth is the gale of embarrassments and mockery that has being brought to the stable of the Nigeria state under this government. Can one forget quickly how the US President, Barack Obama shunned us for a fast-growing Ghana, or the reported abscondment at the African Union (AU) meeting? I mean, what else is left when a President says things like, “$20Billion will not be missing and America will not know”. What of the Bringbackjonathan# grand misadventure? Nauseating things! The honour and dignity of every agency of government has been eroded because the man who should be in charge has in gross incompetence handed over the mantle of leadership to all manner of power brokers in the ruling party, so much so that the President’s wife found the space to make herself more powerful than even the Vice-President, consistently fighting elected Executive Governor for the control of their states, embarrassingly calling them her sons, quarrelling openly with the few who were courageous enough to stand up to her and embarrassing her husband at every opportunity given to face the camera. When and how did things get this bad one must ask? This is the same country that was at a time proud to have very elegant and intelligent first-ladies such as the delectable Maryam Babangida, the charismatic Fati Abdulsalami Abubakar, the stylish Stella Obasanjo, and even the quiet but dignified Turai Yaradua. Never did anyone of these ones call a World Conference on any burning national issue that was not their business. They kept strictly to their roles as just the wife of the President and never dare step out of line, particularly given that they all had very strong husbands, who would take no nonsense. But not under this Presidency. It is even shocking that not one person could be found, sincere enough to tell the first family the home truth, until the First lady released the most comical hit track in the history of the country, titled, “There is God oooo”, and overthrew the then trending My Oga at the top single from the number one spot on the Billboard of infamies, and left the Presidency in utter tatters. Not so much is left to be said about this Presidency, for that which has been said is certainly a far cry from that which is left unsaid. Every Nigerian, and of course except Doyin Okupe, has felt, is feeling and continues to feel the hurt, trauma and pain of the gross incompetence and manifest waste in the current government. It appears the late world class literary giant, Prof.Chinua Achebe had these ones in mind, when he opined rather despondently, in his work The Trouble with Nigeria, where he said, “The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership. There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian character”. The erudite scholar then ended his admonition by saying, “Does it ever worry us that history, which neither personal wealth nor power can pre-empt, will pass terrible judgement on us?” In a final analysis, one must say that before now, that Buhari’s charisma and competence were fitting enough for the massive task ahead was never a matter up for debate. In fact that his sincerity and uncommon integrity could be ascertained, was in itself never a matter in issue. The icing on the cake however is that even with his towering credentials, the current government in a rather strange course of events, spent the last 6 years doing the ground work in paving the way for a Buhari Presidency via its unprecedented mediocre leadership and colourless governance. Today as Nigerians, we have and hold the correct narrative, and for one, change is here. Gone are the days when a President is thrown up on archaic and pedestrian tunes like shoelessness and goodluck. As this government itself has revealed, the task ahead is far too big for a man whose only meaningful credentials is goodluck and patience. After all, is it not an abiding truth that just one thing, and one thing alone is constant, and that is change. Did they ever mention goodluck? Olusola Adegbite, Esq. is a Lecturer in th Faculty of Law, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
Posted on: Sun, 11 Jan 2015 10:50:33 +0000
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