PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari could be blunt at times. He also has a wry wit. In fact, some of those who know him very well would swear that his sense of humour is remarkable. He deploys it in unusual ways.
Consider that German trip on which he was asked about his wife’s comments on his administration. He did not simply tell his audience that his wife is no politician; he said “she belongs to the other room”. I am sure His Excellency must have let loose a loud guffaw anytime he got comments of women rights activists who suddenly woke up to launch a campaign that he wasn’t right to say that a (his) woman’s place is in the kitchen or in “the other room”. And comedians seized upon the phrase to fuel their trade, ascribing all manner of innuendoes to “the other room”.
The President could also decline to join issues with his critics, taking it all on the chin. Even then, his silence is as loud as thunder. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s epistolary (mis) adventures failed to attract a wink from Buhari, who perhaps in the best traditions of military orientation, would not join issues with a senior officer. Now, who needs to be told how silence has been golden, trumping the din of the marketplace? But Obasanjo, being Obasanjo, would not hold his fire. He keeps screaming that Atiku Abubakar is better than Buhari. Is anybody listening?
Buhari has been asking some hard questions. Sound replies have been hard in coming. He once asked governors: “How do you sleep soundly when workers are not paid?” Of course, there was no reply. A cheeky fellow who claims to be close to some governors sneered at the question. He wondered how the President could understand it all as he does not know how Champagne tastes. “Who won’t sleep soundly after a glass of chilled champagne?” he said derisively.
The President remarked that $16billion was spent on power. He asked: “Where is the power?” Obasanjo, wily and crafty, actually admitted that $6.5b was spent. He advised those searching for answers to visit the ports where the equipment for power projects he initiated were rotting away.
Buhari has also said Nigerians would like to have answers to the “irresponsible expenditures of 1999 to 2004 when oil earnings peaked at about N140 a barrel”.
Now a foreshadow of his last four-year tenure which begins on May 29. I will take tough decisions, he warned when members of the Federal Executive Council visited to congratulate him on his victory at the February 23 election. Ever since he announced this, questions have been flying all over the place. What are the “tough” decisions our President is likely to take? There have been speculations, postulations and permutations on the “tough” decisions.
Will Buhari grab the evil hands behind the herdsmen-farmers killings that have debased our claim to decency? Will he expose their sponsors, seize them and bring them to justice for their horrendous crimes? The military have been battling Boko Haram, the fiendish group that has killed many innocent Nigerians. At a point, we all felt helpless. Now the herdsmen-farmers wars are as worse as Boko Haram’s madness. How sweet it would be if Buhari decides to go all the way against the killers and their sponsors, who the security agents should know.
Will private individuals who own oil blocks be made to shed some of their holdings for states to get a piece of the action? There is the thinking that many rich individuals have lost focus on how to spend the cash they harvest from their oil blocks; they funnel some to oiling the destructive machines we have all over the place. Will Buhari tackle them?
The Malabu oil block (OPL245) scandal remains unresolved, a bad sore that won’t just heal. About $523m of the $1.092b paid for the block was shared out as bribes to some former ministers and by politicians. A former president was named in the dirty deal. Will Buhari hauled them all before the courts?
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) may wish to lengthen the list of banned items to save the naira from pressure and boost our foreign reserves? Local manufacturers will be happy, if we actually stop importing biscuits, cotton wool, eyelashes, eye shadows, eye shades, Brazilian hair, lip stick, lip balm and such frivolous items in the name of beauty care. Will the President approve that more items should join the list?
Will the government carry out its threat to go after the billionaires who don’t pay taxes and won’t even come forward to negotiate how to pay? This also shall pass seems to be their thinking.
Will petrol price go up for the embarrassing high subsidy to end? Will Buhari, being a friend of the poor, embrace the age-long official line that stopping subsidary will free some huge cash for infrastructural development?
A special court for corruption cases has been advocated? Now injunctions are jamming injunctions as lawyers and judges argue over jurisdiction. Corruption cases take years to complete as defence lawyers take advantage of the loopholes in the system. With a special court, so goes the popular thinking, those who deserve to go to jail will go fast and return home early after learning a lesson or two in how to handle public trust. Those who don’t will know their fate as fast as possible. Will Buhari pursue this idea?
Will the President listen to the mercantile advocates of restructuring if they agree that they know what they are talking about? Beyond being a vote harvesting and money minting gimmick in the hands of its insincere advocates, how good is this phenomenon?
A friend of mine could hardly name six ministers and their portfolios the other day. Many are believed to be bench warmers in the cabinet, enjoying all the appurtenances of office without the commensurate hard work that these times demand. Will Buhari throw away the dead woods or kowtow to political considerations in his choice of a cabinet? How long will it take to raise a cabinet?
Many have pointed at the detention of former National Security Adviser (NSA) Sambo Dasuki as a stain on the human rights banner of this administration. Dasuki is being held for alleged diversion of about $2.1b cash meant for arms to fight Boko Haram. His case is in court. He has been given bail, but the authorities won’t let him go home. Will Buhari say why Dasuki must remain incarcerated or let him go?
The Shi’ites keep protesting the detention of their leader El- Zaky Zaky and his wife. Like Dasuki, he is also being held under a thick security veneer that the public finds hard to understand. Will Buhari let El-Zaky Zaky go?
A word of advice: If Buhari wants to have an opportunity to take some tough decisions that will form the legacy of his administration, which will be tabled when the verdict of history comes, he must pay attention to the shenanigans of some opposition figures in the battle for the leadership of the National Assembly.
The UAE robbery suspects
FIVE Nigerians are being held in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for alleged robbery. They were said to have smashed their way into a bureau de change, grabbing its cash and injuring the staff. The camera on the premises gave them out.
When the President’s Special Assistant on Foreign Affairs and the Diaspora, Mrs Abike Dabiri-Erewa, broke the news and named the suspects as some of those disgracing Nigeria overseas, there was anger – apparently because the youngsters (gangsters?) belong to the same ethnic group. Why won’t others be named? Are they the only people disgracing Nigeria overseas? Is it fair? Outrage.
It is all disgusting. We should be ashamed of what these youths have done instead of playing the ethnic card, as we often do. Some of the critics of the name-and-shame went ahead to release on the social media their own lists of Nigerians who are facing one allegation or the other overseas. Okay. But what is bad is bad.
We all have a duty to educate our youths that crime doesn’t pay. It used to be drugs, 419 and prostitution. Now, it is armed robbery. The path of hard work, integrity and honesty can sometimes be strewn with thorns, but in the end it leads to success and peace of mind, which no hot cash can buy.
In scolding our wayward compatriots, ethnicity shouldn’t feature. Crime wears no ethnic badge; it is a universal phenomenon that should be condemned by all – always.
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