Pendulum: Another Appeal to President Buhari and His Supporters; By Dele Momodu

Fellow Nigerians, please permit me to say happy new year to you
all. May God almighty make this a peaceful year for our dear
beloved country. There is nothing greater to ask for than peace in
an election year. And this is the main crux of my message to you on
this page today.

The tension in the land is so hot and suffocating because of the
general elections coming up from next month. In case you are
wondering why I’m specifically appealing to President Muhammadu
Buhari and not to his main rival, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, and the
deluge of other aspirants, let me explain quickly. I’m a social
media addict and through this, I’m able to gauge the mood in public
domain. I have been active in politics since 1982. The first crazy
election I witnessed was in 1983 when the ruling party, NPN,
declared itself winner in several unlikely places. The result was
fatally cataclysmic as people in those areas reacted spontaneously
and violently. Some parts of Yorubaland went up in flames and human
beings were roasted like barbecue meat. About three months later,
the government of Alhaji Shehu Shagari collapsed like a pack of
cards.

The military coup that came capitalised on the recklessness and
profligacy of the Shagari regime as a veritable excuse to torpedo
that government. Politicians were promptly arrested, detained,
prosecuted and jailed and given horrendous prison terms that made a
mockery of the justice system in Nigeria. There were too many
examples of double standards which portrayed the government as
vengeful or outrightly neurotic. Laws were made and backdated.
Journalists were tried by decrees and jailed by fiat, God’s case,
no appeal. Before long, the Nigerian economy took a nosedive and
and plunged into a bottomless pit of misery. The situation was so
chaotic that Nigerians queued for mere commodities like victims of
war or famine. It never recovered until the Buhari government
itself was sacked and banished to the dustbin of history. The full
story is for another day.

The next election, thereafter, was that of June 12, 1993, which
turned out to be the best conducted and the least controversial
until the military government of President Ibrahim Babangida
decided to intervene and aborted a full grown baby just before it
was born. Since then, Nigeria has known no real peace, possibly, as
punishment for this pre-meditated murder of an innocent political
baby. Instead of learning our lessons and apologising to Nigerians
for this unfortunate saga, government after government, like the
ostrich, buried its cocky head in the sand, pretending that there
was nothing special about the election and that life can move on as
normal.

From 1993 to 1999, Nigeria, once more, came under the jackboots
of the military after the short-lived Interim Government, headed by
Chief Ernest Adegunle Shonekan. General Sani Abacha led junta ruled
with iron fists from November 1993 to June 1998, when he suddenly
took ill, mysteriously, and died, and General Abdulsalami Abubakar
took over and handed over to a former military ruler, General
Olusegun Obasanjo, who led a new civilian administration from May
1999 to May 2007.

Interestingly, for a man that many had clearly forgotten about,
General Muhammadu Buhari resurfaced from nowhere, around 2003, and
promptly announced his interest in the Presidential race. It was
like a script out of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, “we have scorched the
snake, not killed it…” Buhari was well and alive. While many
laughed, scornfully, at him, there were those who admired his guts.
Poverty was already growing in the land and politicians had
returned to their days of psychedelic existence. Thus many
Nigerians longed for those days when Buhari took over power and
punished the politicians mercilessly. The only thing they forgot
was that Buhari would no longer be a military dictator with all the
appurtenances of State coercion. And he would no longer have the
collaboration of his second in command, Babatunde Idiagbon. But
Buhari was very smart, or better put, his packagers. He had
transfigured into a friend of the poor and champion of Northern
interests. He returned triumphantly from the throes of disgrace and
incarceration after the Babangida coup. He contested serially, and
stubbornly, on three occasions, against Presidents Obasanjo, Umaru
Musa Yar’Adua and Goodluck Jonathan and lost monumentally, but he
garnered millions of votes from his catchment areas, especially in
the North.

By 2011, Buhari had become battle weary and it seemed it was
over for him. He was quoted to have said he would no longer
contest. But one thing led to another and Buhari’s interest was
re-awakened, and re-activated, by certain interest groups looking
for a way to scatter the ruling party to the winds. PDP was
becoming too comfortable and very self-conceited. It was also
engaged in a silly war of attrition that led to the exit of some
key members of the party. Perhaps, if PDP had not mismanaged its
internal wrangling, the end would not have come at the time it did,
and the manner it happened. Lord have mercy, the grand conspiracy
against the incumbent President, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, would
ultimately go into the history books as one of the most lethal.
Anyway, Buhari returned to the race and contested in 2015, and won
resoundingly.

Buhari’s victory was a popular mandate from all over the
country. We were all very happy and excited and many friends of
Nigeria from everywhere in the world rejoiced with us. The goodwill
Buhari commanded was almost unprecedented. But no sooner than he
took over power that things began to fall apart. I will spare you
the horror of how Buhari frittered away that massive equity, as we
watched helplessly, with our arms akimbo. A few that warned him
about the sad turn of events were soon labelled enemies of Buhari,
friends of looters, corrupt people, who are no longer making and
enjoying free money in the system. It didn’t take long before the
economy collapsed, as scare-mongering crept in on the country
again.

As he did in 1983-85, Buhari renewed his war against corruption
but, this time, without military power to enforce anything. Again,
like it happened to his predecessors, he was accused of witch-hunt
because most of those under siege were members of the opposition.
The blame game also became over-amplified. Every failure, and
frustration, of government was explained away as the stultification
of governance that was brought about by Jonathan and his crew.
Buhari and his acolytes have never stopped groaning and complaining
about Jonathan, PDP, or both. According to the APC, PDP was
responsible for all the bad things that happened in Nigeria. That’s
fine. But the real enemy is time.

Now, suddenly, reality has dawned on the Federal Government that
it has spent nearly four years in power. Yes, time truly flies. And
the next cycle of election has come. The pressure is usually on the
ruling government. This is the reason for my long preamble. The
Federal Government and its ardent supporters would want members of
the public believe they have performed wonders, and that President
Buhari is the 21st century wonder, but this is far from the truth.
Many APC chieftains would normally confess privately, and
confidentially, that they have fumbled, big time, but we should,
please, give, or just dash, them another term, with promises to do
much better.

Personally, I believe it is up to Nigerians to vote for any
candidate of their choice, or fancy. As for me, I’m convinced that
Buhari has already exhausted the capacity to govern a country as
complicated, and convoluted, as Nigeria. I may be wrong. My support
in 2015 was based on certain misplaced hopes and permutations. 1.
That, after 30 years in retirement, he has had enough time to
reflect on his past mistakes and he is ready to make amends. 2.
That he would hit the ground running and pursue the onerous task of
nation-building with assistance from some of the brightest people
it has pleased God to bless Nigeria with. 3. That he would give
more power to his highly cerebral and cosmopolitan Vice President,
Professor Yemi Osinbajo. 4. That he would abhor nepotism, unite our
divided country and treat all Nigerians as free citizens of this
great nation. 5. That he would build stronger institutions and not
tougher dictatorship. 6. That he would empower our anti-corruption
agencies and embolden them to operate without fear or favour. 7.
That he would make the welfare and well-being of our security
forces his top priority in this season of unprecedented anomy, as a
retired General himself. 8. That he would reduce waste in
government to barest minimum based on the promises he made, before
God and man, during his campaigns. I can go on, ad infinitum. But,
to my chagrin, Buhari’s government failed on most of these
counts.

Please, note that I did not even mention issues of the economy,
infrastructure, youth employment and empowerment. I’m aware they
have been distributing ten thousand naira in market places but I’m
not sure how far this can go in a country where over 80 percent of
the population live in abject poverty. Of course, President Buhari
is blessed with some fanatical supporters who see him as the only
saint in Nigeria who will help them deal ruthlessly with the
enemies who have impoverished them. Buhari appeals to this young
Nigerians and they don’t mind if Nigeria is engulfed in mass
poverty. Their attitude is since they are already poor, Buhari
should tear down the whole system and make the rich poor. The sad
part is the fact that they can’t distinguish between those who
worked hard and the so-called looters. Herein lies the danger to
society at large.

I have spent the past weeks engaging with these guys on social
media. Many of them are loose cannons who have become totally
obsessed with the fake mantra that whoever is not with Buhari is a
thief. This may work in favour of Buhari in the short run but may
hurt Nigeria and Nigerians, irredeemably, in the long run. I
foresee them turning into an uncontrollable army if Buhari does not
win the Presidential election next month. Our usually taciturn
President must not keep quiet on this danger waiting to explode. At
76, officially, God has been very kind to him. There is nothing in
democracy that guarantees two terms for a President, so it should
never be a matter of life and death. If you win, you win, and if
you lose, you lose. Every effort must be made to make sure the
precedence bequeathed by President Jonathan is maintained, even if
not improved upon.

I was privileged to accompany the former President of Ghana, Dr
John Dramani Mahama, to The Gambia during the imbroglio that
engulfed that tourist destination after President Yahya Jammeh
refused to hand over power despite the obvious fact that he lost
election in 2017. I saw the great efforts of President Buhari,
Eileen Johnson Sirleaf, Mahama, Mackey Sall and others. It would be
a monumental disgrace for the world to start begging our own
President, in the same manner, to hand over power if he does not
win.

My appeal is to President Buhari to prepare the minds and souls
of his supporters for any eventuality in the next couple of weeks.
If he wins, fair and square, the whole world will celebrate him. I
will join them, as an avowed democrat. But if he does not win, he
should do us the favour of going in peace, and not leave our dear
country in pieces.

God bless Nigeria.