Many Nigerians believe President Buhari, a veteran of war, lost the war against insurgency because of his mismanagement of leakages in the armed forces. Generals whose primary duty is the defence of the territorial integrity of the country lost focus and started competing as to whom among them would build the biggest university in his village. While the president remained indecisive, the war rapidly spread from its Middle Belt epicentre to the Northwest with the insurgents repeated threat to take over the president’s Katsina State driving many to seek refuge in neighbouring Kano State. With increase in daily harvest of death and seizure of victims’ land by immigrant herdsmen while the president writhe his hands, many, including governors of affected states, could not resist suspecting the president was complicit in the tragedy that befell their people.
But President Tinubu made it clear during his last week chat with some selected journalists that he was not going to waste his time on probe, because of his respect institutions. President Tinubu, it must be admitted, knows what he is doing. He is in charge. As one journalist puts it after the presidential chat: “the president is in control”.
But if you ask me, I will say beyond President Buhari’s mishandling of the insurgency war, associated suspected leakages and even the economy, I will say one area that calls for urgent probe is acts of impunity, which has come to define not only current political actors but the successive leadership of our country from Zik to Balewa, Ironsi, Gowon, Babangida Obasanjo and Buhari.
A journey through memory shows acts of impunity has been tragic for political actors and the nation. Zik and Balewa’s act of impunity in interfering in the affairs of Western Region in 1962 led to the death of the Prime Minister, the collapse of the first republic and the subsequent civil war. Shehu Shagari as interior minister, in total disregard for the constitution, also ordered the deportation of Dingle Foot, a British lawyer, representing Awolowo and his 26 fellow accused, from the airport despite having a license to practice in Nigeria.
NPN’s 1979 victory secured through Obasanjo’s act of impunity was short-lived. The party’s 1983 victory, secured through Walter Ofonagoro’s warped theory of “landslide and sea slide victory in opposition strongholds” was also short-lived as violence in Ondo and Oyo states forced the military to return to power.
Once again, besides politicians who hardly learn from history, the major casualty was Nigeria’s thriving economy where Nigeria Airways had a fleet of over 30 aircraft and where the naira was stronger than the dollar. By his own act of impunity, Obasanjo destroyed an inherited healthy economy built through Gowon’s five year development plan and midwifed by pre-independence Nigerian visionaries including Obafemi Awolowo, Anthony Enahoro, Aminu Kano, Edwin Clark, J.S Tarka etc.
Ibrahim Babangida came in 1985 and in share act of impunity, hilariously declared himself president without elections, decreed two political parties, frittered away billons on building party headquarters, introduced Structural Adjustment Programme(SAP) that opened our country to imported goods that eventually killed our budding industries. He went on to annul the 1993 election won by MKO Abiola and whimsically imposed a short-lived interim contraption called Interim National Government. His perfidy signaled the end of his military and political career.
Obasanjo who claims to only listen to God as president was no respecter of constitution, institutions or political office holders. He supervised rigging of elections, masterminded removal of party leaders and impeachment of governors and National Assembly leaders.
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But if we must stop the vicious cycle, we have to start with Buhari’s era. Of course, Buhari unarguably is a patriotic Nigerian. He fought a war to keep Nigeria one, walking on foot form Makurdi to Port Harcourt. He served three years in prison for standing on the side of Nigeria against apostles of IMF and exporters of wheat.
But like most of us, he no doubt, has his personal weaknesses. For instance, he has been accused of being a slave to his religion, of cronyism and provincialism and distrust of politicians. But this was a leader who in the night of many knives was betrayed by his close allies including IBB who after a consensus on policies thrust for the nation, turned around to accuse him of ‘arrogating to himself absolute knowledge of problems and solutions’.
He also fears politicians. He had picked Edwin Ume Ezeoke, as VP candidate during his first shot at the presidency in 2003. He was however abandoned in court by Ume Ezeoke who went to join the winning party. In 2007, he picked Dr Chuba Okadigbo, a second republic senate president as VP candidate. The story was not different. Okadigbo abandoned him in court and sought accommodation with the winning PDP.
In 2011, he picked Pastor Tunde Bakare. He was to realize too late that Yoruba as discriminatory voters, are hardly influenced by tribe or religion in a nation where Christian Bishops, Muslim Imams and traditional worshippers coexist within a family and are in fact intolerant of pastors with extreme views. Even while without “political structure, he vaulted on the back of Bola Tinubu” to power in 2015, even as Tinubu remained an outsider during his eight year presidency.
But the act of impunity by those crusading zealots who falsely swear by Buhari’s name while serving other tendencies in his government and others who exploited his human’s frailties, is the reason why incorruptible Buhari, perceived to be above board, and whose military background was thought to have prepared him for war against Islamist Boko Haram, ended up presiding over an administration defined by corruption, that deepened ethno-religion cleavages between Christians and Muslims and left a legacy of kidnapping, mindless killing and insecurity.
Topping our list is Defence Minister, General Mansour Dan-Ali. His unrestrained comment: “If those routes are blocked, what do you expect will happen? These people are Nigerians and we must learn to live together with one another. Communities and other people must learn how to accept foreigners within their enclave. Finish!” as response to the killings of over 70 farmers in Benue only emboldened immigrant herdsmen to visit more violence on innocent subsistence farmers in the north; it similarly set the tenor of response of Mansour’s men to the demand for justice by victims of herdsmen who took over their land.
It was perhaps this denial of justice by Nigerian security forces that occasioned former Minister of Defence, General Theophilus Danjuma’s 2018 clarion call on his people: “ rise to protect yourselves from these people; if you depend on the Armed Forces to protect you, you will all die”; this ethnic creasing must stop in Taraba, and it must stop in Nigeria”.
There is also Abubakar Malami, the Attorney General and Minister of Justice. As against the pursuit of justice for victims of herdsmen violence, he focused on sting operations to capture and fly Nnamdi Kanu from Kenya to Nigeria for “inciting violence through television, radio and online broadcasts against Nigeria” and DSS’ midnight invasion of the residence of the Yoruba activist, Sunday Adeyemo, because “he and his group, in the guise of campaign for self-determination, have become well-armed and determined to undermine public order”.
While Malami was urging Buhari to sanction those who violated non-existing pre-independence grazing routes in the south, he was silent on the 415 grazing reserves established by the northern regional government in the 1960s “which have succumbed to pressure from rapid population growth and the associated demand for farmland, overrun by urban and other infrastructure, or appropriated by private commercial interests.”
We can add to this list Garba Shehu, who has nothing against the setting up of 10,000 strong Sharia Hisbah police corps by northern Sharia governors who believe their priority was to arrest anyone sporting “indecent dress” but was fiercely opposed to the Southwest ‘Amotekun’ security outfit, or “whatever name they call themselves”.
That he picked up a quarrel with the late Ondo State governor, Rotimi Akeredolu for ordering criminal herdsmen out of his state’s reserved forest, but was silent Taraba Emir of Muri, Abbas Tafida’s 30-day ultimatum to Fulani herdsmen to vacate his forest in July 2021, speaks volumes about his true intentions. .
We also remember Isa Pantami, who as the Director General/CEO of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) was charged with developing the ICT infrastructure to counter Boko Haram despite opposition of well-meaning Nigerians. As it turned out, his promise to disrupt communication activities of insurgents had exact opposite with terrorist coordinated attacks on railway, airports and military formations and seamless negotiation of ransom with victim’s relatives.
Impunity by our leaders and political actors has continued to be the bane of our society. We can therefore not delude ourselves by deciding to focus only on today because yesterday was gone. Today is but a reflection of yesterday. Today’s social dislocation, economic hardship, economic anarchy, unhealthy ethnic rivalries are but offspring of yesterday’s impunity of forced centralization. We have to decide the tomorrow we want today. Otherwise tomorrow when scores of other Emefieles with 11.4 billion slush fund and 775 duplexes and the likes of Bauchi’s Bala Mohammed Bello who is currently mobilizing to take over power in 2027 after telling us that all AK-47 wielding Fulani immigrant herdsmen are not only Nigerians but have the right to protect their cows against Nigeria’s subsistence farmers.
