By Mohammed Dahiru Lawal
SIR: After three bumpy years as the 45th President of the United States, Donald J. Trump was impeached by a 230 to 197 vote on Wednesday December 15, 2019 in the US House of Representative, for ordinarily obstructing Congress and abusing power in relation to his dealings with Ukraine.
This establishes Mr. Trump as the third President in the over 200 years of American history to have ever been impeached.
The Court (US Senate, as one American puts it) may likely not follow in the wake of the House due to its reported Republican majority, but, whether Trump is eventually removed or not, the 45th President of the United States has been effectively discredited and his record will remain dented.
At least this is what happens in societies where public record is a matter of sacred significance. So much relies on integrity as Robert Green will readily agree.
Whether Trump deserves to be impeached or not is not my drift, but that the proceeding reaffirmed true democracy as intolerant to impunity and unruly dispositions that are not amenable to discipline or control and the fact that between the comportment of the legislatures and the reaction of the US citizens on social media lies tons of lessons for both Nigerian politicians and citizens alike.
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For instance, instead of using the FBI to unleash state terror on the House of Representative or bundle up opponents overnight, President Trump sent a conscience pricking letter to Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, part of which reads, “you are turning a policy disagreement between two branches of government into an impeachable offence have no doubt that the American people will hold you and the Democrats fully responsible in the upcoming 2020 election.” Please note “the American people” NOT “my office!”
On the side of the legislatures, the Republicans did not engage their Democrat counterpart in fisticuffs on the floor of the House, neither were symbols of legislative significance destroyed in a bid to outwit themselves. You could feel patriotism and love for country in the way they move and talk.
One even said he does not know what history would be told tomorrow, but today it should be told that, justice took a stance, even though he doesn’t feel good voting for the motion. It could be seen clearly that arguments and positions taken were determined by ideals.
While the impeachment proceeding was going on, millions of views, comments and reactions were raining in on the internet. One of the streams on Fox News Facebook page recorded 1,707,248 views at a point, BBC; 1.7m views and over 24 thousand comments, CNN; 2,017,000 views and over 700 thousand reactions, but, at least an appreciable percentage of those reactions were not fraught with disdain, bile, or hatred for contradictory beliefs or takes. Interestingly, Nigerians in some forums were busy abusing themselves on the same topic that concerns the same Americans that were so civil in their own takes.
In the entire impeachment saga lies tons of lesson for Nigerian’s to learn from, but are we even learning?
- Mohammed Dahiru Lawal, Bayero University Kano.
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