The Nation Newspaper

Category: Idowu Akinlotan

APC’s teething and identity battles

In a day or two, it will be clear how successfully the two-year-old All Progressives Congress (APC) has fought the many battles confronting it without fissuring dangerously or setting the stage for future upheavals. The party was conceived and born in battle, suckled in battle, and weaned on the fiery and tempestuous fields of intense and sometimes sanguinary jostling for primacy. Given the sometimes destructive and disruptive effects of its founding culture of aggressiveness, the party and its supporters may already be looking wistfully ahead to the day when it will rest from its many battles and terrifying exertions. Right from its birth in 2013, the party had been primed for war. Two dizzying years of battling the enemy and triggering a revolution of sorts have made the party to fight so convulsively that a few of its own children have been consumed by the revolution.

In the past two or three weeks, this primed war machine, which unprecedentedly and shockingly swept the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) away in a blitzkrieg, has been engaged in an intense primacy fight for the nation’s top legislative posts. The battle is complicated by stated and unstated factors and objectives, a part ideological, and a part simply political or group interest. The battle lines may not be clearly delineated, but the subterranean forces shaping the battle are easily discernible. Indeed, for a party that won the presidency by nearly 2.6 million votes, and took 60 out of 109 Senate seats and 225 out of 360 House of Representatives seats, it is a miracle its internal turbulence has not undermined its burning resolve and hunger for power as well as its appetite for war.

In the early days of merger, when three major political parties and a faction of a fourth came together to form the APC, quite a number of its own sceptical members and a few top PDP leaders predicted confidently that the amalgamated party would unravel one way or another. Its objectives, the PDP scorned, were neither altruistic nor concise enough. It was obsessively sworn to capture only power, and perhaps immorally desperately. That objective could not be realised in two short and turbulent years, let alone by an amalgamation of strange bedfellows, and certainly not in 2015, the PDP leaders argued and boasted.

The APC, however, defied gravity. Despite the jostling for influence among the party’s many tendencies, a jostling complicated by the addition of five PDP governors about nine months after the party’s founding, it stayed united enough to engage the ruling party in series of ideational, social and political battles, to organise pacesetting party primaries, and to hammer out a relatively concise party platform. What kept them united is a little hard to fathom. Perhaps, they had burnt their bridges and had nowhere else to go or to retreat. Perhaps they were more prescient than anyone gave them credit. Perhaps, also, the party’s many competing tendencies imagined it would be less tasking and cumbersome to achieve ideological and group primacy within the new party than outside it.

It is not certain that the battle for the soul of the party, of which the struggle for top legislative positions is just a part, will be determined in the next few days. The party won a major election in a spectacular fashion while its own soul was still undergoing formation and maturity, and when its identity was just crystallising. No one knows when the party’s structure, identity and culture will be fully formed. What is more, no one can say precisely whether the poll victories of March and April will have a positive or deleterious effect on the party. The picture may be clear in a year or two. By that time, certainly, there will be many internal victims of the party’s many battles. Barely a year after the part’s founding, some of its principal inspiration, such as Tom Ikimi, Ibrahim Shekarau and Annie Okonkwo, felt suffocated enough to resign.

While the media and analysts have focused on who is battling whom, and who is enjoying the upper hand, it is more useful to draw the attention of the party and the public away from personalities to what the party must represent and the ideas and visions needed to ennoble its actions and goals. The suspicion is that the battle for legislative positions at the moment is driven by personal ambitions rather than higher party goals and philosophies, by hubristic struggle between tendencies and individuals, and by short-term manoeuvres and short-sighted power accretion. If the ongoing battles end in such a manner that the party is structurally sounder and subliminally ennobled, then the fights would have been worth it. The public will wish that triumphs in the party are inspired by persons and leaders with a nobler sense of the future.

The spectacular collapse of the PDP is partly explained by the general absence of a galvanising party philosophy. Notwithstanding claims to the contrary by some of its leading lights, the indisputable fact is that the PDP really stood for nothing. If the APC is to endure and flourish, it must stand for something grander and more sublime than its programmes and manifesto indicate. The ongoing struggle in the party must lead in that direction, and produce avatars and custodians of that futuristic ethos in the noble sense often envisioned by the world’s leading statesmen and conquerors.

June 7, 2015
Buhari’s businesslike speech

As far as speeches go, President Muhammadu Buhari’s inaugural speech was not his most creative or inspiring. And even though quite remarkably he delivered it much better than he had done in recent years, and addressed many salient and troubling national issues, it hardly proceeded beyond the serious ordinary, a businesslike speech from a man and politician more obsessed with reflecting reality than climbing the esoteric heights of rhetoric. He seemed to serve notice, by the barely 2,000-word speech, that his government would emphasise substance over the meretricious. In his first coming as a military head of state, when his elocution was much more endearing than it is now, when the invincibility of youth pushed him to brinkmanship and great daring, he felt the encumbrances of age and military rule less than his cautious, slower and more reflective inaugural speech exuded.

In 1984-85, his style led many to believe he was an inflexible ruler, disdainful of consensus. But his speech last Friday, minus the influence of his 72 years age, gave the wholesome impression he was misunderstood or misread during his first tour. He learns, he builds consensus, and he is not a reed unwisely refusing to bend before the wind, especially when that wind has nothing to do with the great and noble elements of life, such as principles and other political virtues. President Buhari says he has changed. This is not the whole picture. What has changed about the man, as his speech conjured, is not the essential Buhari, to wit, his fidelity to honesty, his wholesome embrace of truth, his quaint philosophy of family, and his fanatical admiration for values and virtues that ennoble and differentiate a person. What has changed is his understanding, not his person, of some of politics’ and life’s eternal verities in accordance with global standards and shifting mores.

During electioneering, he had been compelled by the electorate to admit his wife into the campaign trail. For so ascetic a man as the former army general, voters were pleasantly surprised to discover he had not only a beautiful wife, but also a beautiful family. By compelling him, voters humanised him rather than limited or diminished him, and they even raised him to an unusual if inadvertent aesthete of culture and fashion, and a purveyor of grace and goodness. But he was, and apparently still is, also a traditional man, with a distinct and decent streak of religiosity. And despite his accomplishments in military and politics, he is still at bottom a shy man. As he alighted from his vehicle at the inauguration ground, he went many brisk paces ahead of his wife, as if he felt the discomfort of many faces harshly focused on how this intensely private man would relate with his wife in public. When he was gently admonished by former president Olusegun Obasanjo to go round the VIP Box to acknowledge the presence of the many dignitaries who graced the occasion, he imperceptibly restrained his wife from following him as he made his way up the stand.

President Buhari has come a long way, both in maturity of view and in social graces. He is no longer the starry-eyed military officer of some 30 years ago, nor will 21st century Nigeria with its feral social media and intrepid orthodox media allow him the privacy he covets. He has managed to secure a beautiful wife and family; the world will scrutinise how he relates with them. Without doubt, it seems obvious that even in this awkward area of his life, he will also learn and mature much faster than anyone will give him credit. They may not be able to get him to kiss his wife in public, for that will be the day, but they will get him to match his brisk pace with her dainty pace. And his daughters, who have shown independent and admirable personalities of their own, will be hard to restrain in living their now very public lives, especially considering how well in the past they had comported themselves.

Like sportsmen and musicians, politicians and especially leaders are in fact leading celebrities. But it was not just as celebrity that the crowd that thronged Eagle Square on Friday wanted to assess President Buhari. Yes they would have loved the president, the vice president and their wives and children not to be too far apart, and they would have loved, after the president took his oath, to have the first and second families stand together on the platform where they were sworn in. For, attending inauguration, wherever it is done, is the perfect symbolism and embodiment of politics as entertainment. But much more, the crowd also wanted to hear the president speak, and for that speech to grab them with all the literary and psychological ornaments of fine words, great statements, fiery promises or threats as the case may be, and any other thing deemed efficacious in arresting and entertaining the crowd.

In his perfectly synchronised but sedate speech, President Buhari neither inflamed the crowd nor alarmed the elite. Probably the most alarming thing he said was his poetic declaration that he belonged to everybody and to nobody. It was the perfect statement indeed for everybody who feared that the president could be a hostage to one religion or ethnic group or the other. Perhaps it also assured the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and any other political party fretting in dark and obscure corners, that the president could be less schizoid about other parties. And probably the most stirring part of his speech was when he remarked about Nigeria’s founding fathers in the opening paragraphs, and assured that the people would not regret voting him into office. He also reminded his audience of their proud heritage, of the empires that had dignified their parts of the country.

Other than these few inspiring statements and assurances, there was little else in the speech but normal reiteration of promises made during electioneering. He would tackle Boko Haram by relocating Army headquarters to Maiduguri. But former president Jonathan did that too, if a little unsuccessfully. He would take more than a passing interest in what is happening in the other tiers of government, especially the local government. Perhaps he can; but he will navigate testy legal and political grounds to do that successfully. He will continue to support the amnesty programme, which he reminded the country would end in December, and will redirect efforts to developing the blighted oil rivers. Well said, and an indication of his comprehension of the weaknesses of the programme.

It is difficult not to go away with the impression that President Buhari deliberately refused to inflame or alarm the people with his tempered speech. He had made greater speeches and statements before, even during electioneering. He was never as tedious as his predecessor, nor as burdensome and ponderous as Chief Obasanjo. In fact his austere phrases, not to say the overall terseness of his speeches, have their own invaluable appeal. Last Friday, his speech was businesslike, to the point, achieved brevity and conciseness, and conformed to the image of a leader whose bona fides Nigerians have grown to appreciate and trust. It will be a rare thing indeed that President Buhari can be tutored to write or deliver better speeches than he has done so far.

What will not be in doubt is that he will act with far better acuity and purpose than he has spoken. The reasons are his inimitable intuition, hard work, honesty of purpose, and patriotism. He will respect democratic values, as he has promised, but he will nonetheless hit malfeasance and sloppiness as hard as he has become accustomed to. He may lack depth in certain areas of modern economics, but he will make up for that with his indisputable eclecticism, and reliance on trusted and brilliant aides. He talked of immense goodwill following Nigerians and himself to Friday’s presidential inauguration. It is hard not to get the feeling that time and the elements appear to be combining to favour him and the country he is trying to salvage.

May 31, 2015
Star-studded federal and state governments

With the principled and determined President Muhammadu Buhari elected in March and sworn in last Friday, there is hope that the problems confronting Nigeria would meet more than their match. The president will be assisted by his second-in-command, Yemi Osinbajo, a law professor with enormous experience in government. Their expected synergy is anticipated to give hope for sound and deep-rooted democratic practices and institutions, which are sorely needed in Africa, in addition to a research-oriented and knowledge-driven party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), giving the system the needed push. If the president manages, as expected, to assemble a great and brilliant team, governance, democracy and development will benefit from the unquantifiable spinoffs of a successful election.

More than the great expectations at the federal level, the outcome of the polls in the states and the quality and vibrancy of the men thrown up by the elections give even greater hope of a much brighter tomorrow and firmer democratic practices. Nigerians will be busy paying attention to the men and women turning things around at the federal level. But they will be even busier watching and engaging the men and women turning things around in the states, for it is not only the President Buhari government that is believed to be star-studded. Unlike the last four years when just a few states made deep impression on the public, many more state governments are expected to shine bright and strong. They deserve serious attention.

Lagos will sustain and consolidate its great developmental strides, considering how fortunate the state has been in voting the same party into office thrice. The general benefits of continuity, not to say the continuing implementation of a developmental master plan, will ensure the new state government will hit the ground running, as indeed the last governor, Babatunde Raji Fashola did. Ogun and Oyo are also enjoying the good fortune of continuity, as the two governors have been awarded a second term in office. Ogun in particular has dreamt great dreams. It is expected to get the chance to execute lofty projects that will make the state compete with Lagos.

Adamawa may not have elected the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Nuhu Ribadu, former boss of EFCC, a man widely considered a moderniser, but the state will nonetheless cause a stir nationally with Governor Bindow Jibrilla. Even more telling, the solid democrat and brilliant young barrister, Aminu Tambuwal, former Speaker, House of Representatives, will cause more than a stir. He will bring Sokoto State squarely to the national domain, where he, more than his state, belongs. He will get a lot of attention, partly because his leadership skills will make him dare mighty things. Consider also the case of Kaduna State where the activist and impatient builder and moderniser, Nasir el-Rufai, will be holding court. If he can manage to put a lid on his fiery temper and bridle his tongue, he is expected to do wonders.

Then there is also Rochas Okorocha of Imo, who despite his sometimes casual resort to flights of fancy, has carved a niche for himself as a builder. Because of his ambition to climb higher to the national level after governorship service, he is expected to use his second term for great legacy projects, as someone who has a reputation for challenging himself, and using himself as a benchmark. Katsina’s Aminu Masari will very likely draw a lot of attention. As Speaker of the House of Representatives, he showed grit and principles in the face of executive interferences. His understanding of democracy and his preparedness to sacrifice everything for it will make him one leader to watch, not only in his state, but also nationally before too long.

The states, it is turning out, will be an incubus for future national leaders and developmental giants. They give hope that democracy will be well nurtured and protected, and the economy and the people well nourished. If anything, the quality of men in the states suggests that democracy may be here to stay. With a federal government shining brightly, and states showing off their lustre, it seems indeed very promising that Nigeria may be preparing to take its place as a continental leader after all.

May 31, 2015
Mu’azu, first scapegoat of PDP’s failure

Once the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) lost the last presidential election, it was anticipated there would be mayhem in the party, part of it manifesting in exaggerated hysteria. What no one was sure of was the nature of the mayhem or hysteria, and who the champions of the political bloodletting that would ensue would be. There were only suspicions. But finally, after weeks of pressure, the party’s national chairman, Adamu Mu’azu, and Board of Trustees (BoT) chairman, Tony Anenih, have resigned their positions under unbearable pressure. Their resignations have made clear how the battle is shaping up, the direction of the bitterness gnawing at the party’s innards, and those likely to be consumed by the time the last scapegoat is disembowelled and his head hung on a spike. No one can predict the war in general, for the combatants, to paraphrase Machiavelli, can only will the war into being, but cannot determine how it would end. As a matter of fact, the war is just beginning, and the first battle has just been joined.

So far, the war has been limited to the leadership of the party. Sometime soon, perhaps, it will engulf the rank and file and then assume brutal and probably uncontrollable dimensions. There has been a mighty throwing of tantrums among the leaders, but once the bitterness and animosities trickle down to the supporters, many of them unperturbed by the niceties of party philosophies and the false and forced decorum exhibited by the clumsy custodians of the party’s soul, the true scale of the coming mayhem will be revealed.

Alhaji Mu’azu may not appear to have many loyalists in the party for now, for the very vocal and vexatious members of the party leadership have seemed to take control. But the former chairman obviously represented a tendency within the party, a tendency whose strength, viciousness, and preparedness to do battle have not been tested. Those loyalists will rise at the proper time, if not directly in defence of the fallen chairman, then at least in defence of what he stood for or symbolised. President Goodluck Jonathan was the real face of the PDP in the last electoral war, and, by virtue of the ignominious defeat the party suffered at the hands of the All Progressives Congress (APC), the emblem of that defeat. He often disguises his ruthless ability to joust with his enemies, presenting as he always does a facade of a meek and engaging peacemaker. In reality, he is the one inspiring, or at worst conniving at, the revolt taking place in the party’s leadership.

The president’s men are undoubtedly manning the barricades against the Alhaji Mu’azu tendency, from the pugnacious and uncouth Governor Ayo Fayose of Ekiti State, to the dandified Bode George, a PDP chieftain, and other grovelling party leaders from the Southeast and the South-South. A few political leaders from the North, including Governor Babangida Aliyu, have also called for change in the party leadership. The resignation of Alhaji Mu’azu and Chief Anenih indicates that one side to the party conflict is having the upper hand. That side is the one which accused Alhaji Mu’azu of not being committed to the cause of Dr Jonathan’s reelection. That side, on which the outgoing First Lady, Dame Patience, stands solidly like a rampart, struggled to make the last election a divisive and abusive one. It was even alleged that the president once moaned that if he had a few more brutal and irreverent men like Mr Fayose, his reelection campaign, which was floundering at the time, would be saved.

From the shape of the battle so far, and notwithstanding Dr Jonathan’s false pretences as an urbane, cultured and statesmanlike politician, the assemblage that had just forced Alhaji Mu’azu out is made up of hawks and iconoclasts. They are a group of politicians who would have loved to engage in a brutal fight for the presidency before the polls. They would have plumbed the nadir of filth and fought dangerously on the edge of anarchy to retain the presidency. That is their philosophy. They regret the vacillations Alhaji Mu’azu’s urbaneness pushed them into. As they pine away at their loss, they recall with indescribable pains the many times the party under the former chairman called for decent campaigns, polished language and fair and modern methodologies.

Though the war in the PDP is just beginning, the emergence of the hawks should serve notice to the rest of the country, and particularly the incoming government, that it is indeed urgent and inescapable for Nigerian politics to be redefined, circumscribed and organised under new laws and sophisticated rules. It will help the bright and modernising minds in the PDP to fight for the soul of their party in order to rebuild it into a sensible and credible political opposition for the next four years. Nigeria has no place for the buccaneers attempting to hijack the party, not even the pretentious Dr Jonathan. The PDP is of course expected to differ from the APC in many ways, especially ideologically and structurally, but it must be compelled to operate within the ambits of the law and along civilised lines. If the APC government does not build and police such a political environment, it will itself be unable to inspire obedience, let alone the new society envisioned by its programmes and manifesto.

Apart from the opportunistic hawks plotting their way into dominance within the PDP, the resignation of Alhaji Mu’azu, and that of the many others in the National Working Committee (NWC) expected in the coming days and weeks, may suggest that party leaders have already decided Dr Jonathan was not a major factor in the party’s defeat. This is mindless escapism. More than any other factor, Dr Jonathan’s constant indecision, frequent gaffes, his unmanageable and squabbling First Lady, policy miscarriages, poor economic management skills, absentmindedness on security issues, and general inattention to details doomed his presidency and triggered his reelection debacle. Incredibly, Chief Anenih’s resignation is sold as a means of creating room for the president at the top of the party’s BoT. In other words, while Alhaji Mu’azu is being punished for heading the party during its defeat, the man whose failings and personal idiosyncrasies catalysed that electoral tragedy is rewarded with probably the most powerful post in the party.

Apart from making appalling mistakes in repositioning the party for the future, or perhaps presumptuously for 2019, as a few key party leaders suggested a short while ago, and also misreading the factors responsible for the last electoral debacle, the main challenge the PDP will face is how to unify the party in the face of their defeat and exclusion from the plum pickings of power. For now, the northern component of the PDP is less assertive and reticent. The Southeast and South-South components have seemed to hijack the decision-making process and appear bent on rebuilding the party around their most notable party figure, Dr Jonathan. They are unmindful of the fact that the same argument that applied to Alhaji Mu’azu’s forced exit also applies to Dr Jonathan.

It is necessary for the PDP to present a formidable opposition to the APC. But it is doubtful that having more poignantly misruled the country for a little over five years, and having not inspired the country, nor formulated precise and practicable ideas as to how a modern and complex society should be governed, Dr Jonathan should now be found fit to inspire a new, stronger and reinvigorated PDP. Worse, having also failed to identify the real factors responsible for PDP’s loss, and having also refused to properly and accurately gauge the mood and direction of the country, the new opposition party may be in for more fractious and turbulent time. What the PDP needs is a clean sweep, not only of personnel, including ragamuffins parading as state and national leaders, but also of jaded ideas. Until they do these, unify the party ethnically and religiously to create a secular organ, and promote bright and visionary leaders able to present viable doctrinal and practical alternatives to the APC, they will freeze in the cold for much longer than the 2019 they naively conjecture.

May 24, 2015
As Buhari assumes office in the worst of times

President Goodluck Jonathan should be leaving office in a blaze of glory, as they say, buoyed by the immense though undeserving goodwill he garnered from conceding defeat to Muhammadu Buhari, his opponent in the last presidential election. But from all indications, he will be leaving in five days time in a blaze of infamy. The economy is prostrate, with more than half of the country’s 36 states unable to pay public workers their wages, and the federal government itself using its big muscles to borrow to pay its own workers. Boko Haram, the terror group Dr Jonathan had hired mercenaries to fight, is staging a big comeback, perhaps inspired by the never-say-die philosophy of ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Syria), and the president and his expiring government are at their wit’s end to respond both to old and new terror challenges.

There are a hundred and one challenges grave enough to arrest the wandering attention of Dr Jonathan, but he has chosen to illustrate and reiterate the fact that until he hands over on the last constitutional day permitted, he remains the president. To underscore this bland and mundane fact, he has seized upon his knack for the extravagant to sack and replace some of his ministers and aides. Shortly after he lost reelection, and citing disloyalty, he sacked his police chief, Suleiman Abba, a few weeks before leaving office. Then, supposedly bowing to the will of a group of protesting workers, he also sacked Saratu Umar from the top post of the Nigerian Investment and Promotions Commission (NIPC) barely two weeks to handover. He perhaps felt it demonstrated his presidential resolve, his stamina for the long haul, his courage in the face of public queries and even opposition. In addition to a number of appointments, contracts largesse, and some other shake-up here and there, Dr Jonathan has managed to complicate a few things for the incoming Buhari government.

President-elect Buhari therefore faces a grave crisis of expectations immediately he assumes office on Friday, a crisis that could easily translate into a crisis of confidence if he does not hit the ground running with the boldness, brilliance and courage the public hoped he possessed when they voted for him on March 28. But with the country left gasping for breath by Dr Jonathan, not to talk of his deliberate and unwise muddying of the bureaucratic environment by the sacking and appointment of aides and ministers, the president-elect will have to decide whether to embark on the time-consuming job of carefully disentangling Dr Jonathan’s needless complications or cutting the Gordian Knot. To find his way through the thicket, assuming he prefers the first option, the president-elect will need to assemble the best team ever put together by any Nigerian leader. The men are available; but will he find and recruit them, even if they punctuate their brilliance with independent-mindedness?

If the president-elect chooses the second option, which is sometimes not as drastic or offensive as it sounds, he will evoke images of his military background, step hugely and brusquely on toes, and, as former British Prime Minister Tony Blair suggested in Abuja last week, move briskly to create a mighty and unforgettable impression. Whichever option he picks, the president-elect will have his hands full taking care of the ponderable mess Dr Jonathan’s government will be leaving behind, whether in the economy as a whole, or in the oil industry in particular. Sixteen years of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) government have left an almost indelible mess; it will take a lot to clear them up. In the face of an impatient, impoverished and suffering populace, President-elect Buhari’s methods, timing, policies, style and views on salient national issues will come under harsh scrutiny. The public and other arms of government will test his resolve, and in particular his newfound democratic credentials and convictions, some of which he has exhibited with so much public aplomb.

The president-elect will, however, remember a few important points as he assumes office in this demonstrably worst of times. He will remember the almost divine trajectory and dizzyingly short time his party the All Progressives Congress (APC) took to win office, and what needs to be done to sustain it in power. He will remember how gingerly his amalgamated party was cobbled together, and the delicate mechanics of keeping peace among its competing, sometimes desperate tendencies and often unyielding personalities. He will bear in mind that unlike the PDP that governed Nigeria over many fat years, his cobbled party is expected to preside over probably many lean years. He will also recognise that the PDP had no governing and ennobling philosophy. If the APC, which is just two years old, is to make a difference, it must enunciate a sharpened and holistic governing philosophy, one capable of transforming Nigeria from continental opprobrium into an ideational and continental leader. APC leaders must also design a new paradigm for running their party devoid of the group and caucus conflicts that undid the PDP.

To do all these and perhaps more, President-elect Buhari will need depth, courage and a sublime ability to navigate the ethnic, religious and political maze Nigeria has been transformed into by past governments, military and elected; not the good luck that served his predecessor well for a short time and harmed the country so deeply and so badly.

May 24, 2015
Boko Haram and our mercenaries

Shortly before President Goodluck Jonathan’s government announced the postponement of the general elections initially scheduled for February 14, there were speculations the elections might not hold altogether, or that at best it would be postponed perhaps indefinitely. Eventually, when the postponement came through a tangled skein of announcement that jostled back and forth between a reluctant Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and an eager Chief of Defence Staff, Air Chief Marshall Alex Badeh, it was for six weeks in the first instance. Nigerians were deeply sceptical. In fact, the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) believed the postponement was a breather to afford the dispirited and frantic Dr Jonathan the opportunity to arrest the momentum triggered by the APC candidate at the time, Muhammadu Buhari, and stave off what was thought to be the president’s anticipated defeat.

But a stonefaced Air Chief Marshall Badeh told the public that the military needed six weeks to neutralise Boko Haram and make the elections safe and credible. Analysts had wondered why the government seemed very sure that Boko Haram, which could not be defeated or neutralised in more than three years, could suddenly be degraded sufficiently in six weeks to enable a smooth election. A few short weeks ago, the jigsaw seemed to have fallen into place. The missing piece was apparently supplied by South African mercenaries who had been retained by the Jonathan government to fight Nigeria’s war. But despite the rather very public knowledge of the role the mercenaries are playing in the Boko Haram war, the Nigerian authorities are still prickly about the subject.

So far, both the military and the government have refused to confirm stories of the role the mercenaries are playing. Those who suggested that mercenaries were fighting the war for Nigeria, including the sceptical and critical Nigerian media, were tagged unpatriotic and disloyal. A German radio reporter, Musa Ubale, who publicly posed the question of the mercenaries to visiting Chadian President Idriss Deby last Monday was disaccredited from covering State House activities and expelled. President Deby of course deflected the question very cleverly, but Nigeria was not so clever in handling the embarrassing matter with as much delicateness as the troublesome subject demanded.

And just about the same time the Jonathan government was taking umbrage at media questions on the mercenaries, the leader of the mercenaries in question, Eeben Barlow, formerly of the South African Defence Force, but now retired, was addressing the Royal Danish Defence College on how he had led his band of about 100 mercenaries to degrade Boko Haram as a fighting force. Now 62 years old, the colonel explained that as bush war experts, age was not a disadvantage. In detail, he carefully led his audience through tactics and logistics he and his men, some of them veterans of special forces units, deployed against the band of ragtag Boko Haram insurgents. He was careful to suggest that Nigerian soldiers were demoralised and disorganised.

Why Nigeria is still denying the role of the mercenaries in turning the tide against Boko Haram is unclear. However, the news of the mercenaries as a factor in the counterinsurgency operations in the Northeast is everywhere in the media, local and foreign. Col Barlow has seemed to make the job easier for Nigeria by identifying where the problem with the Nigerian military lies. According to him, the Nigerian military is demoralised and disorganised. These problems had been identified even by Nigerian soldiers in the early part of the war. But rather than face these issues squarely, rather than address the complaints of deserters and mutinous troops, the military brass preferred to fling the law and military rule books in the faces of deserters, some of whom have been, or are being, tried for mutiny.

Consequently, the problem with the Nigerian military has refused to abate. In a move that is clearly image-damaging, if not outrightly treasonable, the Jonathan government opted to recruit mercenaries without legislative backing, paid them well — by some account nearly $500 per day — and engaged in frenzied procurement of weapons through extra-budgetary processes. This clearly indefensible financial haemorrhaging will have to be investigated painstakingly, in addition to setting up a board of inquiry to examine what went wrong over the years with the Nigerian military. The Jonathan government was not responsible for the birth of Boko Haram, a fact it keeps stressing, but it was astonishingly remiss in tackling it, even allowing the menace to fester badly and dangerously. And to worsen its laxity and complicity, it has done everything wrong in fighting the insurgency.

More embarrassingly, last week, Boko Haram insurgents once again threatened Maiduguri’s suburbs. In fact, to cap a bad week for Nigerian arms, the insurgents were reported to have retaken the northern Borno town of Marte. The beleaguered town has oscillated between Nigerian and rebel control more than thrice since the Boko Haram war began. After learning of what befell Marte, displaced Nigerians planning to return to their liberated towns will think twice before committing such a rash action. They will be unsure whether the military actually has a holistic strategy to defeat Boko Haram and keep recaptured territories safe and secure. Or they will wonder whether the insurgents are not being emboldened by a supposed fracture in relations between Nigeria and its mercenaries. Given the government’s reticence in the war so far, few explanations are expected to be offered to help citizens make sense of the yo-yo between federal troops and insurgents.

It was wrong and embarrassing for the Jonathan government to be so precipitate in tackling the German radio reporter’s question. It suggests the government had something to hide. But no matter how many reporters are expelled, the Nigerian military will still have to address the question of how the war is being fought, and what, if any, are the roles being played by South African mercenaries. They must also grapple with the image problem and ethical crisis such a big and supposedly powerful country like Nigeria is having by recruiting mercenaries to fight a war weaker and less endowed neighbouring countries like Chad consider a cakewalk. Chad has a military strength of about 30,000 men in a population of a little over 10 million. Nigeria has a troop strength of about 200,000 in a population of about 170 million, and about 300,000 paramilitary personnel. Less than 10,000 men were needed to wage the war against Boko Haram militants numbering less than eight thousand men, but Nigeria failed to muster this number for reasons only Dr Jonathan’s government can explain. Worse for Nigeria, Col Barlow’s mercenaries were not more than 100, before whom Boko Haram fighters have fled. Clearly, too many things have gone wrong.

The president-elect, Muhammadu Buhari, himself a retired army general and former head of state, has reassured the country he would prioritise the Boko Haram war and knock the menace into a cocked hat. He has promised to find out what went wrong with Nigeria’s once proud military, and find and quickly administer the necessary remedies. He will find his countrymen backing him to carry out the rebuilding required to restore Nigeria’s fighting image. There will be no quick fix as he has warned, nor are Nigerians expecting facile solutions. Let Gen Buhari proceed with the firm caution and determined and calculated deliberateness needed to give Nigeria a rebirth in every broken area of national life, starting with the military. The country has been thoroughly disgraced by the recruitment of mercenaries, especially white, former apartheid soldiers, many of them old enough to father a good number of Nigerian soldiers who have proved unwilling or unable to fight.

May 17, 2015
Redefining political persecution and national cleansing

In his controversial remarks at a farewell and thanksgiving service held in his honour in Abuja, President Goodluck Jonathan, among other dubieties, prepared the minds of his ministers and aides for what he felt certain would be their lot soon after he vacates the presidency. Prejudging President-elect Muhammadu Buhari’s modus operandi, Dr Jonathan insinuated that his successor would needlessly execute policies and inaugurate inquiries both designed to afflict officials of the last government. Addressing his loyalists on the implications of conceding defeat to Gen Buhari, the president had said: “If you take certain decisions, it might be good for the generality of the people, but it might affect people differently. So for ministers and aides who served with me, I sympathise with them, they will be persecuted. And they must be ready for that persecution.”

The president obviously conflates a panel of inquiry into clear or suspicious wrongdoings with persecution. He regards Gen Buhari’s suggestion to investigate a few individuals and government agencies, particularly the NNPC, with hefty insufferableness. There will, however, be a number of inquiries, though the president-elect has said he will not be bogged down probing his predecessor. No matter what warnings have been given by the outgoing president, some of his aides and ministers, especially in agencies where humongous sums of money were illegally taken for the purpose of funding Dr Jonathan’s reelection, will be probed. Indeed, contrary to the president’s apprehension, the suspicion in many circles is that Gen Buhari will struggle not to probe agencies and ministries where a lot of stealing took place. But because the scale of stealing would probably be huge, he will have no choice but to probe, even at the risk of categorising the process as a deliberate and calculated persecution of opponents or something more sinister.

Importantly, as is typically Dr Jonathan, he often engages in insouciant, definitional imprecision. But persecution involves harassing and punishing someone who has done no wrong, or because of his political, religious and cultural beliefs and persuasion. Inquiries, on the other hand, implies an effort to serve justice after wrongdoings had been investigated and blames apportioned where necessary. If there is a thin line between the two, it exists either only in the minds of those crying wolf where there is none or where indiscrete and selective probes are ordered to punish a target, prove a point, or stigmatise the opposition. Gen Buhari will likely conduct himself above suspicion, given his antecedents and his recent philosophical convictions.

In any case, persecution or no persecution, the public will leave their elected leaders in no doubt what is expected of them. Gen Buhari was not elected to sympathise with those who under Dr Jonathan, or perhaps earlier, undermined the peace, security and financial wellbeing of the nation. The president-elect probably understands that, and being a hard man himself, will very likely refuse to be incommoded by the feelings and sentiments, or even the persecution complex, of his predecessors and opponents. He knows why he has been elected to preside over the affairs of Nigeria in this most dangerous and inauspicious of times. He will discharge that responsibility with considerable aplomb and defiance, even if it kills him.

May 17, 2015
PDP’s moment of angst

Led by the vituperative and mendacious Ekiti State governor, Ayo Fayose, many top Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) officials have started to call for the heads of their party’s National Working Committee (NWC) members, especially that of the party chairman Adamu Mu’azu. Perhaps they will have the heads on a platter. But without needing to be sympathetic to the PDP chairman, it is well known that Mr Fayose lied when he said he had evidence the embattled chairman was in league with the All Progressives Congress (APC) during the last polls to bring President Goodluck Jonathan’s reelection project to grief. Mr Fayose is a disturbed mind; he will rock the boat of his party for as long as he remains either in the party or as a governor. The accusations and counteraccusations between leading PDP officers came moments after both Dr Jonathan and Senate President David Mark futilely warned that unrestrained acrimony could destroy the party.

Opponents and haters of the PDP have exulted over the destructive rage going on within the party. They surmised gleefully that all it took to unnerve the self-styled largest party in Africa was just one loss, a loss that has now so discomfited the party that it is sundering dangerously at the seams. They observe that such bitter and acrimonious fights are symptomatic of a defeated organisation, be it a country or a political party. Some PDP members, including Mr Fayose, have latched on to that logic by suggesting that it is customary for party officials who lead their parties to defeat to fall on their swords and give way for the emergence of new leadership. Their arguments are reinforced by the quick resignation that rocked the losing parties in last week’s British election. Alhaji Mu’azu and his colleagues on the NWC, however, retort that the provisions of the PDP’s constitution, unlike the post-election convention in Britain, are clear on how leadership changes should be effected.

It will be naive to expect that the battle to enthrone new leaders in the PDP would cease simply because some concerned party leaders admonish their colleagues to embrace peace and think altruistically of the best interests of their distressed party. The PDP is unaccustomed to defeat. They will need to establish a convention, sans their party constitution, on how to behave in victory and defeat. We are fairly conversant with how they celebrate victory, and how the spoils of war are shared among them. How they mourn or cope with defeat, however, remains the grey area of their party culture. Dr Jonathan himself, in descending on his appointees with the fanatical zeal of the Spanish inquisition, axing and beheading those who crossed his emotions and drew his brittle ire, appears to be laying a curious, somewhat malevolent precedent. With practised ease, almost as if he had forgotten he would be vacating office in less than three weeks, he has also appointed new state officials. He is unconcerned about what his successor might do to or with his last minute appointees.

The internal battles within the PDP may get worse before they get better. With men like Mr Fayose in the PDP, unscrupulous, impertinent and acerbic, the party will be constantly roiled by brutal internecine conflicts to assert hegemony. And with men like Alhaji Mu’azu who can call their souls their own, there will be no let in the war. Alhaji Mu’azu and his colleagues will give much more than they can take, and they will also be unsparing. But no matter how vicious the war, the bone of contention, to wit, who is to blame for the defeat, will never be resolved. Even a harmonised, face-saving and fence-mending sitting of the combative officials is unlikely to produce peaceful resolutions or agreements. The next few weeks, full of figurative bloodletting and bitter recriminations, will be the PDP’s greatest moment of angst.

Both sides to the PDP war are of course wrong to presume, judging from their analyses and what they have said, that they appreciate the real reasons for the PDP’s woeful performance. Mr Fayose’s vindictive scaremongering is of course far from the truth. Neither Alhaji Mu’azu nor any other PDP NWC member schemed against his own party. They might wish that the PDP should not be rewarded for hateful campaigns, given the portentous electioneering embarked upon by divisive and petulant characters like Femi Fani-Kayode, Doyin Okupe, Mr Fayose himself, and more tellingly Dame Patience Jonathan. But it would be far-fetched to argue that the urbane leaders of the party actually worked for the APC’s victory. It may also be true that some northern leaders of the PDP, particularly governors, pulled their punches in the campaigns, but it is unlikely they did so simply because they loved the opposition or their candidates, especially Gen Buhari. Given the context in which the March and April elections were held, particularly the northern milieu, there was little any PDP leader in that region could have done to stymie the revolutionary momentum unleashed by the candidature of Gen Buhari.

Conversely, too, it will be simplistic to suggest that hate speeches and campaigns alone undid the PDP and doomed Dr Jonathan’s reelection chances. While hate campaigns contributed immensely towards the failure of the party, the voting pattern in the last polls suggests quite clearly that a number of other factors were responsible for the revolutionary outcomes never before witnessed in these parts.

Rather than bicker, and because the country needs a virile, sensible and credible opposition, the PDP must be encouraged to engage in hard-nosed analyses of why they failed. There is nothing wrong in the ongoing internecine battles within the PDP continuing for a little while. These battles are needed to enable the party produce real and intelligent leaders for the next four years of its life, at least in the first instance. Once produced, the new leaders will impose discipline on the party, restore unity, and redirect the party to work for and achieve realistic goals and salient objectives. While the party will need to sanitise its internal mechanisms and codify its methods and values, there is little doubt it will also need internal opposition, the kind vaguely represented by Mr Fayose. But the party and its new leaders will have to determine whether Mr Fayose is not a dangerous and needless throwback to atavism.

It is not immediately clear to outsiders who among the many claimants to the PDP leadership is suited for the party’s next decade. It needs party philosophers, but we cannot immediately see any in its ranks. It needs a disciplinarian, but the sensible, disciplined and moderate Alhaji Muazu has a chink in his armour by reason of the defeat it was his lot to lead the party. It needs new values, new sets of beliefs and programmes, and new national focus, but we cannot see anyone enunciating, projecting and championing these. And until they produce great men and leaders who can aggregate these principles and values whatever wars they fight will only bathe their party in blood rather than the revitalising elixir sorely needed to move the party forward and offer credible and toughened opposition to the victorious and fairly more ideological APC.

By all means then, let us encourage the soul-searching and war of attrition going on in the PDP. No one takes perverse delight in weakening or destroying the PDP. The fact is that the country needs a strong PDP; but this new PDP will not come without the party passing through the furnace in order for itself and its ideas to be refined. The process of renewal and rebirth is not of course inevitable. If it chooses to bicker to the death rather than be refined to a new life, then perhaps a new party, rather than the PDP, would be needed altogether.

May 10, 2015
Okonjo-Iweala and states’ unpaid salaries

No one is certain what the Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, hoped to achieve when she explained why some states were unable to pay workers’ salaries when they fell due. The federal government, she said happily, was not owing its workers, contrary to speculations in some quarters. But states which owed their workers, she added, disregarded advice offered through the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee to prioritise salary payments. According to the minister: “Regarding difficulties in salary payments, certain governors are trying to blame the Federal Government for their predicament. This is wrong. They had been told through the FAAC to prioritise salaries but they chose not to do so, hence the backlog that some states are experiencing. The 50 per cent drop in revenues simply means that salaries should be prioritised. The Federal Government should not be blamed for avoidable mistakes made at the state level.”

Dr Okonjo-Iweala’s explanation is patronising and tendentious. Was it simply the drop in revenues that accounted for the cash crunch Nigeria is facing? Many analysts suggest that there are other reasons for Nigeria’s financial woes. Some of these are: humongous waste of national resources, intolerable mismanagement of what is not frittered away, and unpardonable corruption, including unlawful election spending and bizarre and indefensible fuel subsidy payments. The minister of course cannot offer any explanation for these. She assumed it was enough that a cash crunch problem already existed, which states should take for granted and mitigate by forsaking all other priorities. One way the federal government has done its own mitigation is to suspend capital budget disbursement since the beginning of the year, the minister said, without bothering to understand whether states would find that option sensible, tolerable or even practicable.

More importantly, the minister also disclosed that the federal government had had to borrow about N473bn to fund recurrent expenditure, including salaries and overheads, a sum estimated to be a little less than half of the N882bn budgeted for borrowing in 2015. At that rate of borrowing, what are the guarantees that budgetary projections would not be exceeded? And if the federal government had access to such huge borrowings, do states have the same or near half that luxury? Clearly, Dr Okonjo-Iweala’s recipe is not so inspiring. What is at stake here is the reputation of the federal government’s financial managers. While states could have done much better than they have done to lessen the problem of the cash crunch on their people, the federal government has not placed the country on financial ‘war footing’ partly because their laxity has brought the country nearly to its knees.

The incoming president, Muhammadu Buhari, has his work cut out for him. The economy is prostrate, not simply because of the about 50 percent drop in revenues, as the Finance minister casually said, but largely because of the mismanagement of the economy. The federal government, despite patronising militants to the detriment of the security agencies, has not been able to put a lid on large scale stealing of crude oil, nor on the appalling abuse rampant in the downstream sector. In addition, the federal government has woefully failed to curb its extravagant spending habit. Nigerians know it, despite the government’s best efforts to disguise the catastrophe, and the world also knows it, for they are deeply astounded by the Nigerian government’s poor financial management, policy miscarriage, and general indiscipline. Revenues may have dropped by more than a trillion naira, but the real and bigger problems lie outside oil market volatility.

Dr Okonjo-Iweala should keep her gratuitous advice to herself. It is obvious that had President Goodluck Jonathan won reelection, as she hoped, many of the country’s assets would have been sold. She alluded to that option in proffering a solution to Nigeria’s cash crunch. On assuming office, Gen Buhari will have to examine all the options available to his government before making a choice. No one expects the current subsidy regime to be maintained. And it is likely some national assets will not be left untouched. But above everything, there will be a number of inquiries into what went wrong in order to have an understanding of how the country came to this horrific pass. It is only after that has been done, and blames apportioned, and punishment meted out, that the public will support the belt-tightening measures the new president will probably place before the country. And to think starry-eyed states creation campaigners hungered for a few more states, a condition upon which they based their support for Dr Jonathan.

May 10, 2015
Major agenda for Buhari

After voting the All Progressives Congress (APC) into office on March 28, Nigerians will not be able to resist the urge to set agenda for the in-coming government of Muhammadu Buhari. There will indeed be dozens of items on the collective agenda, many of them argued vigorously and persuasively to make them rank high on the president-elect’s priorities. Given the mess made of the country in the past one decade and more, and especially in the past two or three years, everyone will be justified to focus on those critical areas of national life that have become a nightmare for the country. Gen Buhari himself has zeroed in on about four priorities: insecurity, economy/unemployment, corruption, and power. There is little doubt that if he accomplishes these priorities, he will be an instant hero.

A few analysts may go ahead to proffer ways and methods by which the new government could resolve the mess, and they will be right to feel concerned that while there may be a consensus on the problems, it is unlikely there will be a consensus on how best or how less painful the agreed goals can be achieved. In fact, as a columnist with this newspaper observed, in voting Gen Buhari, it is not clear whether the electorate knew what they were doing, or what to expect from him, or how far his abrasiveness could impinge or grate on their worldview, whether political or social. The scale of the mess is truly staggering, and everyone is waiting with bated breath to see which way the Buhari cat will jump.

The aroma of change wafts enticingly in the air, and everyone, not the least the president-elect himself and his All Progressives Congress (APC) party, is giddy with excitement over the dramatic political earthquake that occurred during the last polls. Gen Buhari knows that when he hunkers down to begin the massive work of regeneration and renewal, he will step on huge toes, and his popularity, which is sky-high at the moment, will take a tumble depending on how suavely the new ruling party and its leaders execute their goals.

Gen Buhari’s agenda are consistent and logical spinoffs from his party’s programmes and manifesto. The general in turn also acknowledges huge public expectations, a significant part of which is simple and moderately ambitious. And should president-elect meet these simple expectations, and in ways that neither provoke the poor to irritation and irrationality nor instigate the rich to exasperation and desperation, he will reinforce his image as the man for the times, solidify his party’s change mantra, and enrich and nurture democracy in Nigeria on a truly stupendous scale. However, if he and his party have their eyes on history, if they wish to make their achievements sustainable in the long term and hope that from their efforts world-class governance and democracy would emerge and develop great tap roots, they will have to soar beyond the atmosphere of ordinariness and predictability to the ethereal world of the idealistic and the philosophical. How successfully they manage this greater and more demanding objective will determine how high they climb in public esteem and the lasting impression they will make on Nigeria and the wider world.

Gen Buhari will be confronted with arguments on the need to moderate his ambition for the country on account of the low level of sophistication of Nigerians. They will tell him that if he accomplishes his three or four main goals, not only will the people be satisfied and reassured of a great future, he will be applauded for laying solid foundation for the growth, stability and future greatness of the country. This line of argument is sincere and plausible, and any president wary of the complexities of idealistic undertakings, such as this column is proffering, will yield to its persuasiveness. If Gen Buhari plays safe, as he seems inclined to do by limiting himself to the understandable and the uncomplicated, he will have done well, that is assuming he manages his safe goals successfully. But if he takes the deeper and more difficult road, that is, the obviously more complex, perhaps even philosophical and encompassing alternative, it will be assumed he understands its many nuances, and is capable of midwifing the dream, and summoning the courage and the discipline to stick with it against all odds.

This column therefore offers the president-elect this complex option as a non-binding alternative, for travelling that road requires both profundity and vision. It also must come from deep, intuitive conviction, eliciting great passion and commitment. That alternative road does not preclude Gen Buhari’s priority programmes; indeed, the complex option feeds on them. The priority programmes are the ammunition needed to channel the country’s energies to a lofty and philosophical end, far beyond the commonplace existentialism that traps many nations in either ordinariness, if they are yet to achieve greatness, or decay and decline, if they are already great. This lofty alternative road must inspire the president-elect to recognise that his priorities, which are also invariably our priorities, must be seen as means to an end.

It is not enough to achieve the set goals of fighting corruption, creating employment, and battling insecurity, among other things. These goals are laudable, but their full potentials will not be realised if they are not integrated right from the beginning into the visionary dynamics of developing a great and powerful nation, rivalling some of the best countries around sociologically, politically, technologically and economically. If that template or superstructure of a great and powerful country is not envisioned right from the beginning, it will mean that there will be no enduring and consistent frameworks for today’s and tomorrow’s leaders to apply as models for the task ahead. (Compare and contrast France and Italy after World War II). It will mean that present and future elections will be conducted merely routinely in consonance with the amorphous, conflicting and inconsequential yearnings of the electorate. It will mean tolerating rulers like former president Olusegun Obasanjo who lacked vision and depth, and others like President Jonathan to whom the ordinary art of governance proved inaccessible. It will reawaken the debate on what the purpose of government is, using the Singaporean and American models as examples. Finally, it will also mean that for a long time to come, Nigeria will be satisfied with rudimentary and existential objectives.

The APC and Gen Buhari have done well to articulate their redemptive programmes for the country, but it is not certain how high their ambition is, which great countries or empires serve as their role model, whether their ambitions have irredentist components, if not spatially, at least ideationally, whether all they aspire to is just to copy one country or the other, with all their limiting attributes, or whether in their study and understanding of empires and empire builders, from Pax Romana to Pax Brittanica and to Pax Americana, and from Julius and Augustus Caesar to Genghis Khan, they see themselves and the country it is their turn to lead as a future role model and pacesetter to other countries and peoples. This kind of ambition is not alien to modern Africa. Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana and Gamel Abdel Nasser of Egypt dreamt far beyond the limitations and developing economies of their countries. While war cannot be discounted as an agent of change and expansion, and will still occur on a large scale in the future, the change agents of today are economic and ideational influences.

Gen Buhari and his party must determine where they want to locate themselves in the developmental and historical continuums. Hopefully, their ambition may be much more sublime and engaging than they have stated publicly. Let them, therefore, develop another richer position paper, other than their current blueprint, in which these deeper, inspiring goals are reconstructed as the superstructure on which the general and mundane yearnings of the people are to be realised. If the APC does not produce and execute something much deeper than they have publicly stated, and notwithstanding the fact that their opponent, the PDP, appears incapable of doing any better given their woeful 16 years performance, somebody or another party will rise and fill the yawning gap — if not now, then sometime later.

May 3, 2015