Nigerians Can’t Wait To See Buhari Go

 By Ikechukwu Amaechi

President Muhammadu Buhari has finally admitted that he is overwhelmed by the job he craved and cried for. But Nigerians came to that conclusion long before him. Having waited patiently, albeit fruitlessly, for the president to deliver on his 2014 campaign promises, beleaguered Nigerians who are still wondering how they allowed themselves to be conned seven years ago, have, however, moved on.

They no longer place any stock on his ability to get the job done. Even members of his party – All Progressives Congress (APC) – are too ashamed of the mess Buhari has made of governance.

*Buhari

So, when the president quips that he is eager to go as he did on Monday when he received some APC governors, legislators and political leaders at his residence in Daura, Katsina State, he needs to be told that the feeling is mutual, Nigerians are more eager. They can’t wait to see his back in Aso Rock.

“I am eager to go. I can tell you it has been tough. I am grateful to God that people appreciate the personal sacrifices we have been making. I wish the person who is coming after me the very best,” Buhari said.

Of course, whoever that will succeed Buhari needs all the prayers because the damage is enormous but it sounded ridiculous hearing him lament the phantom toll official duties had taken on him.

When he talks about his personal sacrifices in running the country, it smacks of entitlement. The hubris is insufferable. Buhari thinks he is doing Nigerians a favour being president when he is not.

But if he is now eager to go, Nigerians are even more fervent in that desire. In fact, to the average Nigerian, the best time for the president to go was yesterday.

It is hard to fathom those he claimed appreciate his so-called personal sacrifices, but truth be told, Nigerians will not miss him because even if he leaves today, Buhari will leave the country in a precarious situation far worse than when he assumed office on May 29, 2015.

If Buhari is sincere, rather than wait for another 10 months pretending to be doing a job that he is far from doing, he should resign and just go. He does not need to wait until May 29, 2023. He will be doing himself and, indeed, longsuffering Nigerians a lot of good because with him still in power, things will only get tougher in Nigeria for Nigerians.

His ineffectual leadership even on issues where he ought to have comparative advantage such as security, given his military background, is scandalous to say the least.

Take for instance the audacious attack on the Kuje Medium Security Custodial Centre, Abuja, penultimate Tuesday by scores of armed terrorists and the president’s response.

The commander in chief of the armed forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria pretended to be shocked by both the scale and audacity of the attack.

And what did he do? Nothing, other than posing rhetorical questions. “How did the defences at the prison fail to prevent the attack? How many inmates were in the facility? How many of them can you account for? How many personnel did you have on duty? How many of them were armed? Were there guards on the watchtower? What did they do? Does the CCTV work?”

The reason why the defences at the prison failed to prevent the attack is simply failure of the Buhari leadership. He should know. Asking that puerile question further exposes his cluelessness.

After inspecting some of the points impacted by the attack, he expressed his disappointment thus: “I am disappointed with the intelligence system. How can terrorists organise, have weapons, attack a security installation and get away with it?” Again, pretending not to know the answer to his own poser is the height of hypocrisy because that is exactly what terrorists have been doing all over the country under his watch in the last seven years.

They have been routinely attacking security installations, killing Nigerian soldiers and carting away military hardware even as the government continues to lie to the citizens, claiming otherwise.

After spending about 30 minutes at the Correctional Centre where not less than 450 prisoners, including over 63 hardened terrorists escaped, Buhari relapsed to his pastime: hopped into the presidential jet to attend the International Development Association (IDA) for Africa Summit in Dakar, Senegal.

Any other president in the world whose country was so viciously attacked would have cancelled that trip, but not Buhari.

His Special Adviser on media and publicity, Femi Adesina, said to abort the trip would be tantamount to giving in to terrorists.

“The president should go (to Senegal), because there is an international conference meant for heads of states and presidents; he should attend.

“You should never give in to terrorists. The moment terrorists begin to stop you from doing things, then, we might as well throw up our hands in surrender. The President should go ahead. Yes, it is an international obligation,” Adesina said even when there is no evidence that Buhari’s presence would add any value to the conference. The world would not have missed him if he was not there.

It is also ridiculous to suggest that junketing all over the world attending conferences that the Minister of Foreign Affairs or at most, the Vice President, who, in any case, are more knowledgeable and competent than him, are better suited, is a proof that we are not holding the white handkerchief to terrorists.

More than one week after that dastardly attack, the president who claimed to be disappointed with the failure of intelligence has not deemed it fit to sanction anyone. He is still waiting for the report of what happened as if he does not know, even when the Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP), a notorious terrorist organization, not only claimed responsibility for the attack almost immediately but also explained why: “Fighters of Islamic State attacked Kuje prison in Abuja, yesterday, and succeeded in freeing dozens of prisoners,” the Islamic State’s A’maq Agency said in a 38-second video mocking the president, his government and Nigerians.

But by far, the worst thing Buhari has done to Nigeria in the seven years of his appalling stewardship is to deliberately reawaken the hitherto slumbering primordial monsters of religion and ethnicity, thereby widening the fault-lines that leaders before him since after the civil war worked so hard to bridge.

So, when Nigerians take umbrage at the Muslim-Muslim ticket of the APC in the 2023 presidential election, it is in protestation of the demons Buhari has unleashed on the country. Allowing the APC presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, to get away with the insult of Muslim-Muslim ticket is to reward Buhari’s transgressions in power.

Those who argue that Tinubu’s indiscretion should be excused on the ground that capacity should trump every other consideration in the leadership recruitment process either miss the point or are being deliberately mischievous because the choice of Senator Kashim Shettima, former governor of Borno State, was not informed by capacity. It was a decision taken solely on the basis of his religion, the APC leadership having come to the harebrained conclusion that a Christian vice presidential candidate cannot deliver the votes in the North even when the presidential candidate from the South is a Muslim.

That is the tragic legacy of the Buhari presidency as the former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr. Babachir Lawal, poignantly pointed out in a statement on Tuesday.

With the ruling party parading a cast of “Moslem Presidential Candidate (Lagos), Moslem Vice Presidential Candidate (Borno), Moslem National Chairman (Nasarawa), Moslem Deputy National Chairman (Borno), Moslem President (Katsina); Moslem Senate President (Yobe); Moslem Speaker (Lagos); Moslem Deputy Speaker (Plateau) etc.!” who will argue with Lawal’s scary conclusion that with the Muslim-Muslim ticket, Tinubu and APC are laying the foundation of an “Islamic Republic of Nigeria?”

That is Buhari’s odious legacy. It will get worse in the remaining 10 months, the reason he needs to go now.

*Amaechi is the publisher of TheNiche newspaper (ikechukwuamaechi@yahoo.com)