When a stentorian military baritone voice broke the foreboding monotony of unusual martial music on national radio to announce the coup that signaled the end of the unlamented Second Republic on New Year eve, December 31st, 1983, yours truly was one of the thousands of impressionable young undergraduates that thronged the streets of major cities across Nigeria in wild celebration. The four years of civilian rule between 1979 and 1983 had witnessed the most obscene and stupendous forms of elite pillage of the public treasury particularly by the predatory politicians of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) at the centre; a morbid spectre of rampant corruption that made the much condemned pecuniary malfeasance that contributed to undermining the First Republic a veritable child’s play.
Yet, the venality of the corrupt NPN politicians at the centre was not mitigated by at least a redeeming modicum of performance resulting in deepening poverty for a vastly increased number of Nigerians amidst the criminal opulence of a privileged few. The hope of millions of Nigerians that the 1983 general elections would provide an opportunity for peaceful change at the polls was recklessly thwarted by the massive electoral fraud that saw the NPN retaining power with a much more resounding margin of victory than it had secured in the 1979 elections irrespective of the will of the people.
Could we then be blamed for dancing in ecstasy to the tunes of the martial music that sent the politicians packing in 1983? Could we not be excused for the youthful innocence and exuberance that made us perceive the military as the country’s messiah? Alas, we were poor students of history. For, it was the same way that the bloody mutiny of the young majors that truncated the First Republic was initially enthusiastically received in many parts of the country. It was a sweet good bye to the corrupt politicians and their nepotism as well as divisive ethnicity. And it was welcome to a brand new Nigeria remade in the shining image of the revolutionary and modernizing military many idealists thought. Unfortunately, the military was not only to plunge the country into a tragic three-year civil war, by the time the soldiers returned power in 1979 to the same set of politicians they had overthrown 13 years earlier, the problems of corruption, disunity and underdevelopment had worsened even though the country had hit crude oil as a bottomless gold mine.
A little over a year and a half after the truncation of the Second Republic, the crusading anti-corruption but unrepentantly dictatorial Buhari/Idiagbon regime was displaced in a palace coup by the gap-toothed Maradona of Minna, whose military regime had its no less draconian fist hidden beneath the deceptive gloves of beguiling smiles and ‘subversive generosity’. By the time the military retreated once more to the barracks in near disarray in 1999 after God’s coup had toppled the dark goggled dictator of vice, the country had been brought to the very brink of disintegration. The freest and fairest election in the country’s history had been unjustly annulled in 1993 and its winner ultimately martyred. Corruption had reached stratospheric heights. Nigeria plunged the depths of underdevelopment. Not just Nigerians but most of the world heaved a sigh of relief on the country’s behalf to see the military take leave of the political terrain with the democratic restoration of 1999.
Against this background, it was nothing but a bombshell when the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt-Gen. Tukur Buratai, made the shocking disclosure this week that some individuals had been making overtures to soldiers in recent times for reasons that are yet undisclosed. The statement issued by the Director, Army Public Relations, Brig.Gen. Sani Usman, on behalf of the COAS was direct and unambiguous. According to the Army spokesman, the COAS “has received information that some individuals have been approaching some officers and soldiers for undisclosed political reasons. On the basis of this, he has warned such persons to desist from these acts. He also reminded them that the Nigerian Army is a thorough, professional, disciplined, loyal and political institution that has clear Constitutional roles and responsibilities. Therefore, he seriously warned and advised all officers and soldiers interested in politics, to resign their commission or apply for voluntary discharge forthwith. Any officer or soldier of the Nigerian Army found to be hobnobbing with such elements or engaged in unprofessional conducts such as politicking would have himself or herself to blame”.
It is unlikely that the COAS would have caused such a serious statement to be issued on his behalf without justification. He certainly felt sufficiently disturbed to put both the military and the public on the alert. It has been speculated in some quarters that some disgruntled sections of the political class are trying to instigate the military to violate the constitution and possibly truncate the democratic order as a result of uncertainties concerning President Muhammadu Buhari’s health. If there is any truth in this, such atavistic political elements have clearly lost touch with the country’s political realities. They are vegetating in a dead past that can no longer be exhumed.
The country is into its 18th year of unbroken democratic rule since 1999. It has not been a period without its many moments of pains, tensions and severe stress. Elections have been violently contested, unfairly manipulated and hotly disputed. Communal conflagrations have flared. Religious conflicts have been recurrent. Ethno-regional embers have been stoked. A murderous insurgency had practically laid the North-East prostrate until very recently. A particularly dangerous moment was when a severely physically incapacitated President Umaru Yar’Adua had to seek medical succour abroad without being able to properly transmit power to his deputy. A power vacuum loomed ominously. The country teetered on the brink of constitutional crisis. Yet, the political actors found a creative and pragmatic way out. Our democracy not only survived, it was strengthened.
Today, the country is nowhere near a crisis situation. President Buhari is ailing. He has made no secret of the fact. Each time he has travelled on medical vacation just as he is now, he has kept the National Assembly abreast and ensured there is no lacuna. Quite apart from honourably abiding by the constitutional requirement that he transfers the powers of his office to his deputy in acting capacity in his absence, an emotional synergy has obviously developed between both men on a personal level. Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo admitted as much when he publicly declared in Katsina State during the week that the President treats him like a son. There could be no greater testament to mutual love and confidence. Osinbajo’s demonstrated restrained conduct and fidelity to a boss who has taken ill like any mortal can, has won him the admiration of millions of Nigerians. A deputy who seeks to capitalize on the physical discomfiture of his boss to aggrandize himself in power would lose the respect of Nigerians.
Those politicians trying to exploit President Buhari’s ill-health to goad the military into political misadventure are severely on their own. They do not love Buhari, the military or the country. But Lt-Gen. Buratai deserves plaudits for his professionalism and patriotism. The coups that overthrew the first and second republics were instigated by disgruntled civilians who succeeded in infiltrating and inciting ambitious elements within the military to spurn civilian control. Having received the sensitive information of civilians making dangerous overtures to his men, Buratai could have opted for silence. After all, if the democratic order were overturned, he could be a likely beneficiary from the resultant praetorian order. That is how a soldier-politician would think. It is not unlikely that some top military men who have been susceptible to the carrots being dangled by tempting politicians are already thinking that way. Thank God, Buratai has removed the carpet from under their feet. He is a true professional soldier.
Any officer who thinks that the military has anything to gain as an institution by assuming the reins of political power once again in the country is certainly not worthy of his commission. The military’s institutional coherence, organizational integrity and professional competence have between the greatest casualties of its intervention in politics. That was why a former highly respected Chief of Army Staff during the Babangida years in power once famously lamented that under military rule, the Nigerian Army became one of anything goes. We must never return to those days.
The task of rebuilding the military as a truly professional institution is a necessary condition not only for creating a potent modern fighting force capable of safeguarding the country’s territorial integrity but also for maintaining a sustainable democratic order. Buratai has done his bit. He has shouted from the rooftops and put us all on alert. It is now time for the requisite security agencies to get down to work with a view to identifying, arresting and bringing some treasonable culprits before the law.
