The crown that had eluded President Muhammadu Buhari at three previous elections had hardly settled on his head when he was dealt a severe blow, not by the embittered stragglers of the beaten Opposition, but by the combined forces of a stalwart of the ruling party he had worsted in the contest for the party’s presidential ticket, his acolytes, and the Opposition.
The legislative majority Buhari was counting on to help translate his programmes and policies into law did not materialize. The stalwart had other ideas. In a cloak-and-dagger conspiracy, the machinery of which can be compared to a Shakespearean tragedy, he offered key legislative offices reserved for the APC as of right to the opposition in return for being elected Senate president, the third highest political office in the realm.
That was how Dr Bukola Saraki, (APC, Kwara Central) supplanted Senator Ahmed Lawan Ibrahim (APC, Yobe South) who had been chalked down for the post, in the process emasculating the Buhari Administration and the APC. And that was how Ike Ekweremadu, of the PDP, who had served as deputy Senate president in the ousted Goodluck Jonathan administration, came to retain that position under the new APC Government.
That was on June 9, 2015.
Some members of the National Assembly, remember, were gathered in a meeting hall in Abuja, on the information that Buhari was to address them ahead of the Inauguration of the National Assembly later that day. They were still waiting there when a rump of APC senators led by Saraki, sneaked into the National Assembly, and with support from PDP senators, staged their power grab with forged documents. There, on national television, was a triumphal Saraki ensconced in the Speaker’s chair, gavel in hand.
Why had Buhari not intervened to restore party discipline and due process? For an answer, the usurpers and their supporters fell back on a passage in Buhari’s Inaugural Address, wherein he had declared that, as president, he belonged “to no one and to everyone.” By which he probably meant that, as president, he was enjoined be fair to everyone, supporter and adversary alike.
The sentiment is unexceptionable, but the phrasing was disingenuous. Buhari could not have meant that he was enjoined to be indifferent to the kind of scheme Saraki had hatched to become Senate president. But that was how many inside and outside Saraki’s camp interpreted it and tried to use it to hamstring the president.
In truth, the president belongs in the APC, not in the PDP or any other political party. It was through the exertions of some key political actors that the APC was established and nurtured into a formidable political force. The same key political actors had toiled to ensure that Buhari the party’s presidential ticket. And it was through the exertions of party workers and across Nigeria sympathetic to his agenda that he was elected president.
Now that he is president, he is free turn his back on them and accord their concerns no greater priority than the concerns of his sworn adversaries now in league with a faction of his party?
In theory, perhaps, but not in the world of realpolitik.
Buhari’s problematic phrase was even more widely interpreted as a signal that Buhari intended to cut APC national leader Asiwaju Bola Tinubu to size, now that his role as kingmaker was over. He would be consigned to the margins. He would play no part in the selection of key personnel and wield no influence in the day-to-day running of the administration.
This resolve was perhaps best expressed in the aftermath of the gubernatorial election in Kogi State won by the APC ticket of Abubakar Audu and Abiodun Faleke. Audu died after the votes were in but before the result was officially announced. The best way of honouring the people’s choice was to proclaim Faleke governor-elect and employ the party machinery or some other transparent device to designate and finally consecrate a deputy governor.
But the party chairman John Oyegun was inveigled into referring the matter to the Federal Attorney General who, given his reputation for obfuscation, would turn the whole thing inside out and upside down. He lived up to that reputation; his advisory opinion, adopted wholly by a compromised court, handed the governorship to Yahaya Bello.
Faleke was Tinubu’s candidate; if he was allowed to take power as governor, that would not only enhance Tinubu’s already huge profile, it would also extend his reach and influence to “the North.” Better to contain him; alienate him even, to the point that he felt much more comfortable and more appreciated outside Nigeria than within it.
In today’s political climate, can Buhari still affirm that he belongs to no one and to everyone? I cannot tell. But I do know that his current difficulties resulted from his acting out that dictum.
His agenda is stalled, and his reelection can no longer be taken for granted. The legislative houses in which his party holds comfortable majorities have become an entrenched opposition, holding up his Budget proposals and confirmation of some of his nominees to key positions.
In cahoots with a resurgent PDP, they moved to amend the Constitution to eliminate a provision of the electoral law they believe will play to Buhari’s advantage if he is a candidate, not minding that the amendment could work against whomever the party puts up as its candidate.
Meanwhile, they are poised to dump the APC and embrace whichever party seems likely to advance their personal fortunes – and the public interest be damned.
As things stand now, the APC as we know it may well enter the 2019 race fragmented and hobbled. It will score high on effort and low on results. In formal terms, the responsibility for its performance belongs to Buhari. He is the president and answerable for his acts and for acts done in his name.
In an informal but more damning sense, the responsibility also belongs to his handpicked officials and aides who have taken advantage of his laid-back approach and sought to run the government as a closed shop.
It is to First lady Aisha Buhari’s credit that she saw through this cynical ploy and deplored it.
Irony of ironies, it is to Tinubu that the beleaguered President Buhari has now turned to help bring the feuding factions of the APC together so that the can face the 2019 general elections with confidence – the same Tinubu he and his cohorts have treated most shabbily, for no good reason.
Concerned that he was about to be used again and dumped thereafter, many of Tinubu’s friends and associates urged him to decline the assignment. But his commitment to the survival of the baby he helped bring forth and nurtured to winning form, plus his overarching sense of public service, seem to have supervened.
If anyone can carry out the task Buhari has assigned, it has to be Tinubu. It must be hoped that it is not too late.
