S’eru bawon vs d’aya ja won! — Intimidation vs intimidation!
That’s the government thunder versus the opposition bomb, with 2027 in view, as the Tinubu order clocks two!
The starry-eyed, easily swayed by dummies and counter-dummies, sundry sensation and allied stuff, have more than enough popcorn to crunch, at a gripping movie!
Atiku Abubakar, spurred as always by a wild presidential obsession, trots, canters and gallops all over, in search of a coalition — or even merger — to live his dream.
But he forgets he’s no Bola Tinubu who though declared being president his “life-long” ambition, knew when to feint and when to thrust, until he landed the big prize.
Atiku — jooro, jaara, jooro — (apologies to Fela and his explosive Zombie album), to alleged marabouts’ sweet prophecies, easily forgets his insensate tragedy of 2023!
In response — or is it parri-pasu now? — the Tinubu order, grandmasters of political cut-and-thrust, mounts own foxtrots.
After Delta, another tsunami looms in Akwa Ibom, like Delta since 1999, a PDP fortress! It appears another grim tale of a ragged umbrella torn and ripped in ceaseless gale!
Baba Iyabo, in his Ebora Owu lair, must be taking quite some sombre tutorials! After his garrison command tactics of crude hug-and-crush, he is fated to gawking — with saliva trickling from both sides of the mouth! — as the real McCoys wave the real charm, yet potent opposition poison!
First, Delta. Looming: Akwa Ibom. Next?
It’s defections and rumors of defections all over! And all that from the fella Obasanjo’s powerful machine once rendered the “last man standing” in 2003! It’s true: vengeance is best served very cold!
What did Heraclitus, the old Greek say? You can’t step in the same river twice! Indeed!
As the opposition plots, old paths to the Presidency are fast going up in smoke! These blokes are not unlike the doomed Saddam Hussein, who arrayed his elite Republican Guard in the old staid way of battle, only to be blown away by some nimble, fast and furious, “shock and awe” monsters, from George Bush’s America!
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Still, is 2027 a wrap for the president? Not a chance! But the Atiku armada seems off-pace too by the day! We’ll await how all the high drama pans out.
To seize the people’s minds, the policy front is another theatre of claims and counter-claims.
The Tinubu order claims it’s putative nirvana. The opposition rank scoffs it’s regression to sheer hell. Both play on the hyperbole. The stark reality is in-between.
Still, seeing the Federal Government dish out stats about the economy turning the bend gives you the feeling of deja vu — have we not seen all of this before?
Indeed, the well-loved Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, both under Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan, once bandied similar stats, giving the impression that it was some quarter to paradise.
You have that same feeling, as Tinubu’s ministers belt out their feats two years later. Both eras belong to elite testimonies. The bemused masses are but distant onlookers!
Still, to be fair, there would appear some hard progression.
While the Obasanjo era celebrated “debt-forgiveness”, the Tinubu order is posting the payment of hardcore debts, as any nation with honour and dignity would.
From “rebasing” by Okonjo-Iweala to fatten the cow, a Wale Edun-driven fiscal order, even from a lean cow, is posting the alluring promise of a US$ 1 trillion economy; and seems intensely in the works, doing all the hard restructuring, to make that a reality.
Indeed, the stats look impressive, even to the apolitical; but outright scary to the opposition: exit from the IMF debt list, with the body itself, the harsh doctor from Bretton Woods, issuing a clean bill of health; a US$ 14 billion reduction from the government’s inherited debt stock: US$ 108.2 billion to US$ 94.2 billion in two years.
Sounds far superior to craven — and futile — “debt forgiveness” of the Obasanjo era, which blew oil windfall that could have rebuilt infrastructure, on a pipe dream!
Then, a 4.6% year-on-year GDP growth in 4th quarter 2024, with even more mouth-watering prospects for 2025. Also, 3rd quarter 2024: a record trade surplus of N5.81 trillion: N20.5 trillion exports vs N14.7 trillion imports, powered by non-oil exports.
These stats just prompted Reno Omokri, a Tinubu Saul-turned-Paul, to announce his ringing endorsement for the president to run for second term.
But even for those that cannot crunch economic numbers, there is something much more banal, in the metamorphosis over the years.
The Obasanjo years — the former president loves to brag it was the best of the PDP years — was defined by Works Minister Tony Anenih’s moans of “no cash backing”. That explained the infrastructure limbo of those years; prompting the economic sink.
The Tinubu years — just two years — are boasting good stats, complete with David Umahi, the Works minister that not tantalizes with audacious infrastructure in the works, but also strategic public-private sector initiatives, for all-season funding, to free critical infrastructure of the plague of no cash backing for budgets.
But if the administration were to play less the Titan Atlas, it would admit that it was an admirable renaissance it inherited from the Buhari Presidency.
Had it logged on to that from the beginning, it would by now have built a clear-cut case for a definitive difference between the PDP and APC epochs. That means the government can do far better in strategic communications — at least to counter the cheap talk that APC is no different from PDP. In infrastructure, they are day vs night.
But alas! It would appear the last-regime-must-be-painted-bad-for-mine-to-shine is wired to the DNA of government propagandists! It’s all so infantile.
So, with the Tinubu order seemingly worsting the opposition in both defection politics and solid stats from policies, is the coast clear for 2027? Hardly!
The twin-pillars of its reforms — oil subsidy removal and floating of the Naira — have shovelled far more cash into governments’ till, at all levels. But the frightful inflation both have triggered has made the majority far poorer and miserable.
Though a few rogues have been fingered for both decisions, the “savings” from subsidy have not quite percolated into households, rich or poor.
Folks buy fuel at hiked pump prices. But even when the so-called subsidy thieves ruled the roost, citizens enjoyed far lower pump prices, translating into far lower inflation. That appears a lost paradise now!
Oosa b’oole gbami, se mi b’ose ba mi! — the Yoruba often quip: if the deity can’t improve my lot, let it at least return me to how I was!
Yes, the Tinubu order always says the pains are temporary; and also that inflation is trending down. Maybe.
But for 2027 to be sure, it runs an explosive race against time, for all of these sweet stats to resonate in citizens’ pockets.
In truth, it appears an eerie recap of May 2001 in Lagos, when Governor Tinubu turned two in office. It was a classic ebudola — throaty curses-turned-deluge of praises — as the governor hugged his third year in office.
That might well be a fine historical augury for his presidency. But to make assurance doubly sure, the masses must have a feel of the rumoured coming good times.
