If Nigeria Makes The mistake Of Bringing Back Buhari In 2019!

By Femi Fani-Kayode
In both 2008 and 2012 I warned the world and particularly Africa and the Middle East about the evil of Barack Obama. No-one listened. In 2011 I warned the world about the consequences of removing Muammar Gadaffi for Africa and the Middle East. No-one listened. In 2015 I warned the world and Nigeria about supporting and electing Muhammadu Buhari as President of our country. No-one listened. 

*Femi Fani-Kayode

In 2016 I warned Nigeria and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) about making Ali Modu Sheriff National Chairman of our party. No-one listened. In 2015 I told the world that Donald Trump would win the nomination as flag-bearer for the Republican party and that he would go on to win the American presidential election in 2016. No-one listened.

In 2016 I warned Nigeria and the world that Buhari’s health would present a major challenge for the rest of his tenure. No-one listened. In each of these cases I have been proved right. Now I shall give two more warnings and whether anyone listens to me or not takes absolutely nothing away from me. Mine is to pass on the message and it is left for those that hear it to accept it or not. 

The first is that if Nigeria makes the mistake of bringing back Muhammadu Buhari as president in 2019 that will be the end of our country as a viable, cohesive, tolerant, medium-power democratic nation-state where the rule of law, the principle of equality and the most fundamental civil liberties, human rights and basic freedoms for the individual are guaranteed and respected. Worse still she may NEVER recover. 

The second is that if those of us in the PDP, Nigeria’s leading opposition party, fail to make the right choices for the Presidential and Vice Presidential ticket of our party for the 2019 election we will not only lose woefully but the country will suffer the consequences of our abysmal error and lack of good judgement for the next 50 to 100 years. In short future generations of our people will suffer for it.

 Think about that and let it sink in. We should stop listening to what those that believe that they are the gods of Nigeria and those that we consider to be the “big” and “untouchable” men in our country say. We should stop sheepishly accepting their self-seeking and self-centred choices, we should stop allowing them to impose their will on our future and our nation and we should stop following them like mesmerised and bewitched zombies.

Instead, like the great 19th century poet William Ernest Henley counseled, we must be “the master of our soul and the captain of our ship”. We must understand and appreciate the importance of the prophetic, seek the face of God, listen to what He says, be guided by His leading and accept only His choices.

The result of our consistent subterfuge, ignorance, folly and sheer obstinacy over the last 57 years in Nigeria is that our people have suffered immeasurably. We were once the giant of Africa but over the last two years we have been reduced into a weak, impoverished and inconsequential vassal state made up of quislings, cowards and slaves and whose people are bought and sold in distant foreign lands for as little as $200. Consider what is happening to Nigerians in Libya and yet there are no consequences.

That is what we have now been reduced to: a nation whose people can be castrated, murdered, enslaved, caged, bought and sold like cattle and whose organs can be removed and harvested for ungodly gain and profit. Nothing can or will change until we get the right leaders. Nothing can or will change until we reject the counsel and leading of the devil and his human agents that hold sway in our country and instead listen to and courageously enforce the counsel of God. The choice is ours.

Permit me to conclude this contribution with the following. I watched a video of a press conference that President Nana Akuffo-Addo of Ghana and President Emmanuel Macron of France gave a few days ago and I was not surprised by Akuffo-Addo’s sheer courage and refreshing eloquence because I have known him for at least 45 years. In his speech, which touched on the issue of African slavery in Libya and the migration problem, he did not just do Ghana proud but the whole of Africa.

No other African leader has been able to articulate the issue as clearly and succinctly as he did on that occasion and I urge every Nigerian to search out the speech on Youtube and listen to him carefully. He brings hope to a continent that is stark, dark, poor, weak, corrupt, cowardly, self-destructive and plagued by tyrants, despots and ignorant and incompetent leaders who delight in shooting down bright young stars, shattering dreams and destroying the future and destiny of their own people.

Akuffo-Addo is the exception and his words in that short press conference inspired millions of black people all over the world. This is what happens when you have a brilliant, British public school-educated, Oxford University graduate as your President. In that intervention he was profound, insightful and incisive and I am proud of the fact that we went to the same prep school (Holmewood House in Langton Green, Kent) many years ago. He attended the school a number of years before I did and went on to Lancing College in Sussex and when I finished there I went on to Harrow School in Harrow on the Hill, Middlesex.

The only mistake he made was that he went to Oxford and not Cambridge but I guess we can live with that! I am very proud of him and what he is doing for his people in Ghana. Even Emmanuel Macron was clearly surprised and impressed with his foresight, knowledge and understanding.

Sadly in Nigeria we don’t have people like this as Presidents and leaders. Those that I am referring to know who they are. These are men who play God and who believe that they must impose their will on our nation and our people until the day that they die. Yet thankfully all hope is not lost. We must not despair because our future and destiny lies in our hands. If we make the right choices I have no doubt that we shall achieve our full potentials and take our rightful place in the comity of nations.

I say this because despite all our challenges and mind-bending viscidities and in spite of our dearth of good quality leadership, we remain a nation of proud and noble souls and great and beautiful people. Nigeria is a lion. She is powerful and resilient. She is enduring, long-suffering, irresistible and irrepressible. She is more than a nation. She is an inexplicable monument of irreconcilable contradictions. She comprises of many countries all wrapped up in one awesome mighty mega-nation. She is a life-force. She is both a tangible and an intangible entity all at once. She is a living spirit and a powerful soul. She is the only country on the African continent that has a true identity and whose people yearn for her when outside her shores.

Everyone on the continent looks up to Nigeria. She is their heart and their hope. Even if she is restructured or if she breaks up tomorrow and goes under a thousand different names we shall still see ourselves as first and foremost Nigerians. Nothing can take away the strength and essence of a mighty and roaring lion. We are many nations within a nation. We are a mega-nation of believers. We are the pride of Africa, the hope of the black man and the beloved of the Lord. We shall endure, we shall excel and by the grace of the Living God, we shall rise again. 

*Femi Fani-Kayode is a Nigeria former Aviation Minister