By Segun Ayobolu
As the ruling party in the centre and in several states, the All Progressives Congress (APC) has not only the responsibility of maintaining the security of lives and property across the country, the primary and most important duty of government, but also to ensure good and effective governance across diverse spheres and sectors. It is obvious that security is one of the most serious challenges that the APC governments at the centre and in the states confront. On assumption of power in 2015, the party inherited the protracted Boko Haram insurgency in the North- East from the erstwhile ruling party, the PDP. However, under the APC’s watch, this dire and combustible scenario of insecurity has widened nationwide to include Banditry and kidnapping in the North-East as well as widespread herdsmen-farmers clashes in the North- Central and sundry criminalities by herdsmen in the South-West and South-East. We cannot also discount insurgent and separatist restiveness and agitations by some elements in the South-West and South-East, mostly motivated by what is seen as the President Muhammadu Buhari administration’s skewed appointments and policies allegedly to favor his own part of the country to the detriment of others.
It is, of course, inevitable that the dire security situation would have unsavory consequences for agriculture and food production as well as for economic recovery and sustainable growth generally. This has been worsened by the unanticipated Coronavirus pandemic which grossly affected the country’s main revenue source, crude oil sales, thus resulting in hugely plummeting national revenues. Consequently, inflation has risen astronomically, food prices have climbed steeply and the already deplorable state of social service delivery has worsened further. All of these have taken the shine off the administration’s otherwise commendable effort in completing critical road and rail infrastructure that had been long abandoned by the preceding PDP governments as well as initiating new ones.
Given the serious nature of the challenges confronting the Buhari administration, it is unfortunate that some elements within the APC have chosen to play distracting and potentially disruptive and destructive intra-party politics rather than allow the administration at the centre and the states controlled by the party to focus in a single minded manner on the problems that have life and death implications for huge numbers of the citizenry. For instance, it is a grand irony that the bandits, kidnappers and other criminal elements in the north in particular are focused, determined and serious-minded in seeking to achieve their nefarious objectives. This much was demonstrated,once again this week, by the bandits’ shooting down of a fighter jet belonging to the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) in Zamfara state. The criminal elements obviously have continued to upgrade their fighting capacity and this must bother both the administration and the military.
What the APC confronts in presiding over the affairs of Nigeria in these troubling times is a multi-dimensional crisis that requires its unflinching focus and concentration to effectively deal with. But it is exactly when the party machinery and its stakeholders should be working hard to enable the President deliver on the party’s electoral mandate, that debilitating and unhelpful intra-party wrangling have become the order of the day within the APC. When the governor of Zamfara state, for instance, decamped from the PDP to the APC in June this year, no less than 11 APC governors were on ground in Gusau to receive him into the party. This was absolutely time-wasting and needless. Many of these governors face serious crises of governance in their respective states and should not take their eyes off the ball even for a single minute. It is obvious that the criminal elements that constitute such a danger to us all have their attention focused on their destructive objectives always.
An example of the kind of distraction I am referring to here is the fact that the Yobe State governor, Mallam Mai Mala Buni, has had his attention divided between the mandate the electorate gave him to govern the state and his assignment as the National Chairman of the Caretaker/Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee (CECPC) of the APC. This is no mean task. For, being National Chairman to preside over the affairs of a party like the APC across the country is no less onerous and demanding than being governor of a state. It is impossible for one man to undertake both responsibilities without one or both suffering badly. Thus, the Chairman of the PDP in Yobe state, Ambassador Umar Mohammed El-Gash, in a recent newspaper interview decried what he described as the governor’s prolonged absence from the state various times as a result of his national assignment for the APC.
As Ambassador El-Gash put it, “To me, his assignment as APC National Chairman should be secondary because they have not elected him to chair the ruling party. Everybody is talking about this; not only we in the opposition but even members of his party are also not happy with the way and manner he is giving much attention to APC national assignment than Yobe and I keep wondering what benefits of his engagement with his party at the centre will be to the state”. To be fair to Buni, he cannot be blamed for having to take on a responsibility given him by his party. The problem lies with those who did not see that there was everything wrong with saddling a sitting state governor with this assignment especially at this time.
To the credit of the PDP Yobe State Chairman, he applauded some of the initiatives of the Mai Buni administration in the state such as the construction of an ultra-modern market in the state capital or the ongoing construction of a Cargo Airport. This means that if he were not distracted by the APC assignment, the governor has the presence of mind and competence to accomplish great things for Yobe State. But when we consider the security situation in the state particularly, it will be seen that it was unwise to saddle Buni with this assignment. For instance, in April, 2021, over 2000 residents were reportedly displaced from Geidam town in the state when it was attacked by Boko Haram insurgents in a prolonged siege. The Executive Secretary of the Yobe State Emergency Management Agency (YOSEMA), Mohammed Goje, said the displaced persons were being camped in Yunusari and Yusafari Local Government Areas. Earlier, in January, 2021, suspected Boko Haram extremists had again attacked Geidam.
Again, in March 2021, suspected Boko Haram gunmen attacked Kartako community in Gubja Local Government Area of Yobe state shooting sporadically and causing widespread panic in the community. The gunmen who reportedly struck at 5.30 am were said to have set ablaze a military formation in the community while also burning down a primary school and a healthcare center. Barely a week after displacing over 6,000 residents in Geidam, the gunmen reportedly struck again in Kanamma, headquarters of Yunusari Local Government Area of the state. In May 2021, the UN office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs stated that about 45,000 residents mainly women and children had fled their homes in Geidam and Yunusari areas after Boko Haram had escalated attacks in the North-East region.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, “Ongoing insecurity in Geidam and Kanama towns, as well as remote locations in Yunusau, Yunufari, Bursari and Tarmua Local Government Areas is impeding access to Internally Displaced Persons. The security of resources to respond to needs remains challenging for government and partners. Multiple displacements and unpredictable movements are impacting efforts to identify and register many of the IDPs. New arrivals in host communities have signaled food, shelter, health and protection services among the most urgent needs”. I cite these examples to show that governance in a state like Yobe cannot be a part time affair with the governor also simultaneously serving as National Chairman of his party.
What should have been a six-month stint for the CECPC to conduct ward, state, local government and the National Convention to restore the APC to democracy and normalcy has become an interminable affair spanning over a year and still with no clear indication when the tenure of the caretaker committee will end. In the interim, therefore, the APC is incapacitated to run as a democratic organization since all its elected organs are dead for all practical purposes and inoperative. The implication is that the party cannot effectively and meaningfully add value to the quality of governance by the administrations elected on its platform at all levels.
It would also appear that the masterminds of the current drama unfolding in the ruling party are bent on decimating the opposition PDP while also exercising a hegemonic hold on the APC by asphyxiating the legacy parties that came together to form the party and enthroning one of them as the dominant and hegemonic force in the party. In the short run, this may seem to be a tantalizing option to take but it is shortsighted and ultimately self-destructive. For, an iron law of history is that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Some elements within the APC may desire to considerably weaken any opposition to the ruling party from other parties while also seizing control and eliminating other tendencies within the party.
But that was also the path charted by the PDP, which delighted in weakening and destabilizing opposition parties and at the same time sought to eliminate all contending tendencies within the party in favor of a hegemonic clique that sought to exercise absolute control over the party’s affairs. This strategy worked to the benefit of its perpetrators in the short run but ultimately resulted in the implosion that led to the PDP losing power at the centre in 2015, a catastrophe from which it is yet to recover. Let us hope that the APC can learn the appropriate lessons and quickly return to the path of internal democracy in its own best interest.
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