Barring any last minute hitch, President Buhari’s long awaited cabinet should begin work in a few days time. It took two months of wrangling to hammer out the list of 43names. And as it is traditional, all the people that will talk today and the days ahead are likely going to do a review of the Buhari presidency every 365 days after the cabinet gets into full swing. But instead of a review, I am going to do the direct opposite; a preview and actually make it look as if the Buhari presidency is only about to begin today. I am not saying that Buhari has lost nearly half-a-decade doing nothing. I am saying there are ways he can spend the already unraveling second term of four years doing things and reaching a super performance rate of one thing, one day by May 29, 2023.
And I can tell you on my honour that Buhari is ready to work. I can still recall my voyage to Aso Rock Villa in 2017 on his invitation and I saw the passion to work for the good of Nigeria written all over him. But there is a little problem. The man loves, almost like an obsession, to spend his best time and energy reworking the bad work of the past. However, if Nigerians can fast and pray say for 40 days to redirect his passion back to the work at hand, the review could be sweeter by the end of his tenure.
For now, the reviews that will be going on shall add little value. They could even encourage the President to continue in the past. I am therefore saying that instead of these reviews that will make us to perpetually look back with so much anger and even risk being turned to pillars of tasteless salt in the process, Buhari and the entire APC team should be encouraged to look ahead with hope. It is the best way to move forward. For instance, if he and the APC had started looking forward right from day one on May 29, 2015, perhaps, the direction as to where we are headed today would have been much clearer for even the blind to see.
Now, as I speak and with all that I profess, I cannot tell exactly the description that fits the Nigerian economy. Some say it has recovered fully from recession, others say, it is only slowing down and yet others say it is showing signs of stress and stagnation. Whichever that applies, what I can tell convincingly is that getting public electricity is almost akin to seeing an oasis in the desert. In fact, public electricity is lacking everywhere. It is neither in homes nor offices.
When I did the math recently, I discovered that the contributory pension I am doing towards my retirement had been obliterated by more than 50 per cent. The monthly salary is under severe attack too. I had planned to retire in a couple of years and I do not know what experts would advise in the wake of this ferocious attack on both income and savings. Very likely, they shall recommend more tightening of belt until I am cut into two at the waist. At the corporate level, the tightening has eaten beyond the flesh into bones as companies take turns to close shops while the few still standing on one leg are dissolving gradually under the economic heat like copper in Nitric Acid.
If the lamentation since May 29, 2015 continues into this fresh second term second term, I swear, it shall degenerate into wailing and absolute helplessness. I don’t want that. Yet we cannot hope for a better tomorrow without working at it. As I said, I was in the den to see the lion. I recall he is still roaring.
Consequently, there are several indications, especially in the polity, suggestive of the notion that the President sees order from a solely martial perspective. He is not convinced about the interplay of thesis and antithesis (counter tendencies) to reach synthesis which is far more enduring in the resolution of existentialist contentions than a grave yard peace achieved through conquest. He exhibits a readiness to forgo civil engagement for a military option; something close to a Nazist Final Solution, in all situations of difficulties. For the umpteenth time, President Buhari last week bared the fangs of the State on the so called #Revolution protesters, whose arrow head, Omoyele Sowore has already been incarcerated by the DSS. The reality is that there are a million Sowores out day to who raising key national issues that Buhari should provide leadership to resolve. With these strong armed tactics, which the Buhari Presidency has adopted, it appears to be restating the point that he will brook no civic opposition and that there would be no engagement but a clash of forces in which one side must go under for the other to stay on top.
During his heady first term from 2015 to 2019, similar messages, and actual manifestations of state repression were targeted at Biafra agitators and their comrades in the oil-rich Niger Delta called Niger Delta Avengers. The outcomes of those exercises in muscle flexing, including Operation Python Dance and Crocodile Smile had a serious backlash for the nation’s economy. Precisely, country’s daily crude production plummeted to 1.4 million barrels from 2.4 million as the avengers through attacks sought to halt oil production in the region. Oil bearing communities also bore the brunt; a case in point was the military occupation of Gbaramatu kingdom in Warri Southwest local government area of Delta State and homestead of fugitive ex-militant, Tompolo.
It is pertinent for the President to look back at these sore points in his first term. If he does, he will discover that the national mood today and in fact at other times, does not support any form of armed agitation no matter the arguments in support of it. That understanding will provide the leeway for the Presidency to face the governance challenges, instead of boxing shadows endlessly. Nigerians are agitating and killing one another because they do not understand themselves. We do not understand for instance that when there is jaw-jaw, war-war is kept at bay. The battle ground is hardly a place for permanent resolution of human conflicts but whatever solution that is hammered out by parties sitting at the negotiating table will prove the ultimate panacea.
Either as MASSOB, MEND, Boko Haram, Niger Delta Avengers, IPOB or #RevolutionNow protesters, every agitator has got something useful to say about the national question. But they will resort to machine guns when the microphone is forcefully snatched from them when they eager to make their point. This, at once, puts the responsibility for peace on larger society especially the political leadership, which must climb down from its Olympian height to listen. World over, even as agitations for self determination gain traction, the advantages of a mega state remain an attraction. It is the reason the EU, for instance and in spite of British recalcitrance may move from just an economic to a political bloc in the decades ahead.
While the balkanization of Nigeria into fiefdoms to be controlled by warlords does not appear a good option, I want to state categorically that the desired greatness of Nigeria must be erected on a foundation of justice. No trader moves to a new market if the existing one guarantees optimum sales. But today in Nigeria, referendum to divide Nigeria along ethno-religious boundaries may succeed overwhelmingly among groups that consider the central market most unprofitable.
This is the reality on ground and President Buhari is duty bound to show good understanding in his disposition, deeds and speech, especially as the second term revs up with the cabinet. To keep sounding as if Nigeria has been surrendered to him to do as he wishes will be complicating the issues. Going forward, I personally think the President needs more language experts than he needs economic advisers to engage the great issues of the day.
He needs people vast in the nuances of language to tell him that in a democracy especially on global stage where demand for personal liberties is on ascendancy, certain words and expressions are anathema. He should stop saying ‘crush’ ‘ban’ ‘deal ruthlessly’ ‘not negotiable’ ‘no going back ’and so on and so forth. For a start, Buhari should summon the courage and humility to ‘go back on’ his decision to commit the report of the 2014 National Conference to the dustbin and glean whatever that can be used to guarantee a better tomorrow for Nigeria.
Ogbodo is Chair of The Explainer Board of Directors; this Backlash piece is a slight rework of a previous piece written in 2017.
