Until after the
election of Saturday, we are denied the prescience to tabulate its winner and
losers and thus the nation’s president in the next four years. Clearly, poll
predictions, even when they seem to be highly informed, have oftentimes been
trumped by reality. But one thing is certain: We should be preoccupied with a
post-Buhari era if we are genuinely interested in the continued existence of
the country . In other words, the citizens should muster sufficient patriotic
fervour to consign the re-election ambition of President Muhammadu Buhari to
the realm of unrestrained fantasy.
The country is on the cusp of a new era where
Buhari does not fit in. For in less than four years, we have seen enough of the
president to be secure in the conviction that he is a blight not only on the
nation’s corporate existence but also on individual citizens’ lives. Or why has
Buhari’s second coming brought so much hardship to the citizens? Why has he
been a source of massive unemployment resulting in several suicides?
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| *President Buhari |
Yes, we must discount the fact that one or two projects have been
executed by him. How much we should credit him with huge accomplishments should
be against the backdrop of the time and resources available to him. Thus,
beyond the din of the frenetic campaigns for the presidential election is the
imperative of voting right on Saturday to save the nation from catastrophic
collapse. The political leaders are blinded by their ambition and thus cannot
be agitated by the auguries. But it is here the voters should be sober enough
to be aware of them.
The Saturday’s election is not about helping
one presidential candidate to reailse his ambition. It is not about appeasing
an individual or a regional bloc to have access to the levers of power. Rather,
it is about the overarching need to keep Nigeria as one after the election. In
essence, whether Nigeria remains one nation after the election would depend to
a large extent on the citizens. Of course, we are not oblivious to the danger
of the people’s will being perverted through electoral manipulation. Yet, it
should be seen that the citizens exercise their voting rights. For there is a
sense in which it could be argued that no electoral malfeasance that brazenly negates
the prevailing mood of the nation can stand. Now, the nation is in a mood of
entering a new phase of life without Buhari as president.
There are over 70 political parties. Even after some of their candidates have
voluntarily given up their presidential ambitions or submerged them in Buhari’s
for pecuniary gain or be blackmailed to backtrack, there would still be tens of
them on the ballot paper . But the choice is easy to make: Just choose between
the stability of the nation and its disintegration. We may not be so sure of
the person the voters would decide as the best person who can ensure stability.
But we are sure that a vote for Buhari is a vote for the disintegration of the
nation.
If the nation must begin a journey of rebirth
in the coming years, the likes of Buhari as the president are not wanted. The
tragedy is that Buhari was born too late. He should have been born in a
medieval age when the word of potentates was law. In such an age, the members
of his family could hold all the positions in his government. All the top
security positions and lucrative ministries and agencies could be occupied by
his Muslim Fulani brothers and cronies. Buhari readily acknowledges his
unfitness for the age in which he was born by harking back to his military days
of authoritarianism.
Nigerians need to enter an era devoid of
corruption. This should be an era where the fight against corruption is
institutionalised. In that case, the fight would not target perceived enemies.
It would be different from the type we have now where the non-members of the
All Progressives Congress (APC) and the perceived or real enemies of Buhari are
the only corrupt persons in Nigeria. If other parts of the world have such
institutions that effectively fight corruption, there is no reason Nigeria
cannot replicate them here.
The institutionalisation of the fight against
corruption can only be made a reality where there is rule of law. The law
should be no respecter of anybody. In Buhari’s sullied republic, there are two
sets of laws. Buhari chooses the laws to obey and the ones to disdain. This is
why he chooses the court rulings he wants to obey. He is seeking re-election
while he is keeping the Shiites’ leader Ibrahim El-zakzaky and former National
Security Adviser(NSA) Sambo Dasuki in detention contrary to court rulings that
they should be released while facing their prosecution . And having been
surrounded by those on whom different corruption charges are hanging, Buhari is
no longer convincing when he and his aides prattle about being engaged in an
altruistic anti-corruption campaign.
In a country where there is rule of law that
Nigerians want to live in, the government accepts the separation of powers as a
norm of democracy. It would not declare war against other arms of government.
Unlike a government presided over by Buhari, it would not declare war on the
judiciary and the legislature. The president would not intimidate them with
charges of corruption while he himself has not been able to purge himself of
the charges of sleaze against him. Remember his certificate scandal? Remember
the fuzziness over his asset declaration? Was it not Afenifere, outraged at the
ordeal of Justice Walter Onnoghen, that recently challenged him to make public
his asset declaration? Has he judiciously met this challenge?
Nigerians want to be in a country where there
is security. Despite his boast, Buhari has not been able to provide security.
Leah Sharibu is still in the captivity of Boko Haram. Nigerians are still being
killed or kidnapped at an alarming rate. Since it is clear that Buhari does not
know how to defeat Boko Haram and guarantee security, it is logical if somebody
else is given that responsibility. We need fresh ideas and not the jaded ones
of Buhari to tackle insecurity.
Nigerians need a healthy president who can
urgently respond to the problems of the nation. There are the problems of
Fulani herdsmen. Obviously, their grievances that propel them to rape, maim and
kill have not been resolved. They are only waiting for the elections to be
concluded before they decide to renew their agenda of inflicting pain and
carnage.
Nigerians need a president who would be a
unifying factor. Nigeria has been too divided. If Nigerians choose the wrong
person, the divisiveness would be more tragic and unleash baleful consequences.
Nigeria needs a president who would ensure justice and equity .We should
jettison the illusion that those who are oppressed would remain silent and
accept their subjugation. If Nigeria gets the next president right, the nation
would survive. But if it gets the wrong person as the president, there would be
renewed hostilities in the south-south, south-east and other parts of the
country that feel marginalised. In that case, the predicted apocalypse of 2015
may not easily be staved off.
If the citizens collude with the depraved
political class and impose on themselves the wrong president, they should not
whine when their suffering worsens. It would then be clear that they have
willingly chosen to be oppressed over again by a leader who is supposed to
serve them. We should consider as ludicrous the excuse that politicians are the
same and out of the candidates there is no better person. Let us vote for any
person but Buhari. If that person replicates or exceeds Buhari’s tragic
performance, we have to vote him out in the next four years. Just as we gave
Buhari the opportunity to prove himself but failed, so we should give another
person the opportunity to prove himself. It is through the opportunity we have
given to Buhari to prove himself that he has demystified himself. Instead of
perpetuating failures such as Buhari, we should keep on changing our leaders
until we get the right person. Thankfully, periodic elections such as the one
of Saturday provide us an opportunity to do this. And we must seize it.
*Dr. Onomuakpokpo
is on the Editorial Board of The Guardian
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