A LITTLE over a week ago, Kingsley Moghalu, an economist and former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), suggested on a Channels Television programme that Nigerian youths had no clue how to pursue their interests. They were full of talk rather than action, he moaned, referring to what he described as their near absence in the last presidential election in which he ranked 14th with a paltry 21,886 votes for his Young Progressive Party (YPP). Said he: “The biggest disappointment was with the youths. The youth vote was absent. They make a lot of noise, they rant and rail but you will not see them on the voting day. And when they vote, they don’t vote in line with their rhetoric.” It is clear Prof Moghalu was unwilling to take solace in the fact that his party won one seat each in the Senate and House of Representatives.
Though he was unsure whether to contest again in 2023, probably because of the depth of his frustrations with voters and his extreme disillusionment with Nigerian politics, insisting that “it’s too early to make that kind of decision”, it seems obvious that he is as guilty as the youths, whom he blamed for his loss, for misreading and misjudging Nigerian politics. The youths were impressionistic and talkative; but what would Prof Moghalu say of himself seeing that he announced his interest in the presidency barely one year before the election was due? He is probably right that Nigerian youths sometimes misread politics and appear not to know what is even in their own best interests, but the eminent professor also showed little adeptness in appreciating the dynamics of Nigerian politics and elections.
When he announced his interest in running for office in February 2018, Prof Moghalu suggested that his interest was fired up by the “successive leadership failures of our civilian political class”, adding that “With love for our country and a fierce commitment to a vision of rapid progress for our more than 180 million citizens, and following wide-ranging consultations, I offer myself to serve you as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as from May 29, 2019”. At 56 years of age and as a lecturer in international business and public policy, he is vastly equipped theoretically to run a good government. He was in the Central Bank of Nigeria for five years as deputy governor, and had stints with the United Nations. Had he won the election in the dreamy manner Emmanuel Macron won the 2017 French presidential poll, Prof Moghalu would no doubt have been a breath of fresh air in the stale and anti-intellectual corridors of power in Nigeria.
But his freshness and intellectual capacity notwithstanding, Prof Moghalu knows very little of Nigerian politics. He may disagree with its rubrics and feel ashamed that it has tended over the decades to elevate nonentities to office and prominence, but his ignorance of its dynamics, as attested to by his vituperations against Nigerian youths, is truly inexcusable. Contrary to his accusation, the youths he claimed railed and ranted but disappeared on election day, actually voted more than any other segment of the population. And he was only partially right that they often voted against their rhetoric. The electoral body, INEC, is yet to give a breakdown of the voting dynamics of the last polls, but Prof Moghalu will be surprised to discover that the youths he thought so little about could actually teach him a thing or two.
The biggest question in the last presidential election was who among the 78 presidential candidates to trust with the country’s money. The dominant opinion before the poll was that President Buhari, despite his many warts, some of which violently negate his good attributes, fit the bill much more than his main challenger, Atiku Abubakar, a former vice president. In the opinion of this column, Prof Moghalu would have been a far better manager of the country’s finances than the two leading candidates in the last election, since President Buhari does not even understand modern finance, and Alhaji Atiku never quite managed to dispel doubts about his fidelity to financial ethics. It was, therefore, important that the eminent professor proceeded from the mindset that there was nothing inevitable about that biggest question. He was at liberty to coax the country into reframing the “biggest question” just as former United States president Bill Clinton boldly did in 1992-1993, and Mr Macron suavely also implemented in 2016-2017.
Prof Moghalu, however, concentrated his efforts in presenting himself as the best alternative available, emphasising his financial and policy skills, and reiterating the lack of capacity of his opponents, particularly the leading candidates. There was nothing wrong with focusing on his capacity, which was far higher than the two leading candidates’, but in the face of the leading questions of the day, the eminent professor was preaching only to himself. Every segment of Nigeria’s voting population has its peculiarities and weaknesses, and the youths are not exempted. But it was left for an astute politician to understand those idiosyncrasies, probably help to redefine them, circumvent their booby traps, and reshape and redirect the thinking of those population segments. Prof Moghalu was obviously taken in by the rhetoric of the youths; but he did little or nothing to help channel their convictions to something more positive and noble.
One year was not enough for Prof Moghalu to make the impression needed to win the presidency. He should not compound his deficiencies by dismissing youths as full of tendentiousness and rhetoric. If he is made of sterner administrative and intellectual stuff as he gives the impression, he should know that he will still need the same youths in the near future. The youths are in equal measure the hope and bane of the future. A wise politician and candidate will find ways of penetrating their suspicions, dissipating their loathsome superciliousness, and helping their flimsy ideas and expectations to coalesce around something far bigger than they are. The professor should learn from politicians in other parts of the world who rose from ashes and impossibilities to take their countries by storm.
This piece is of course not to endorse Prof Moghalu, for little is known of his temperament or inner qualities. All that can be seen in public is his intellectual prowess, and perhaps too his oratorical flourish. Little is known about the things that have shaped his worldview, assuming his worldview can be discerned from his insecure and tentative approach to politics, and even littler about his views on ethnicity, religion and ideology — whether they are as transcendental as he gives the impression or are significant only to the extent of the treatises his intellectual pronouncements open a window into. Whatever the case, if Prof Moghalu wants to be taken seriously, he must first define himself and impress that definition on the minds of the electorate, particularly the youths. He must also refine his understanding of the issues that shape Nigeria, particularly its politics, economy and society. And then he must recognise that it takes much longer than he romanticises to become an avatar.
It is too early for him to become nasty simply because the manner of his repudiation at the polls was exceedingly humiliating. He was wrong to blame the youths, whether in part or in whole. And it was impolite of him to begin to exhibit the kind of exasperation with the electorate that older and complaisant politicians often display. Far worse for him, especially for a politician who exaggeratedly tries to pose as one of the country’s leading pathfinders, is his disconcerting advocacy of zoning. In the Channels Television programme in reference, he argued that the presidency should be zoned to the Southeast in 2023, presumably to augment his chances. Instead of that fruitless campaign, he should concentrate on becoming an acceptable politician with countrywide contacts, one who is not afraid to champion great and sometimes controversial issues, and one who would not want to be stereotyped. Why, for instance, can he not become the most respected unofficial opposition to President Buhari whose policies and style hark back to the 1950s, and whose promotion of ethnic exceptionalism has contributed significantly to the turmoil in the country?
The next general election will be fateful in ways probably never anticipated. The issues at play will become more complicated; the country will badly fray at the edges because of a long history of hugging illusions; and the divisions and conflicts between ethnic and religious groups will become very difficult to manage. These issues have already become deeply and fearfully problematic. Unfortunately, there are no initiatives of any kind to tackle them. Prof Moghalu and other politicians with an eye on 2023 will have to undertake a fresh examination of these problems and be ready to defend their ideas on how they should be managed. The time to start is now. The old order of instinctive infatuation with retired military officers is disappearing, and President Buhari is probably the last army general to be voted into the presidency, at least for decades to come. A new future beckons for aspiring leaders who are clear-sighted about what should be done with the country’s stultifying and unworkable structure, or with the poor and unthinking style of governance, or with the appallingly poor and damaging policies that emphasise and reinforce sectional and insular interests.
Indeed, if President Buhari will not open up the system to all Nigerians, and humble himself to ask for help from knowledgeably and patriotic experts in finding solutions to the country’s multidimensional problems, 2023 itself will be endangered. It is shocking that the only people who can see and feel the looming danger are those outside this government, a government that seems deliberately impervious to the catastrophe being plotted by Nigeria’s deeply alienated millions, a government that appears not to appreciate how badly the image and influence of Nigerians has waned everywhere.
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