Buhari no longer the only problem

Abimbola Adelakun

At some point, future historians of the present will give Donald
Trump some credit for aptly summarising the dynamics of political
following of our time. During his presidential campaigns, he
bragged that he was so loved by his followers that he could shoot
someone in public and not lose any voter. He has been right so far.
There is virtually nothing he does wrong that has cost him in the
way other politicians have paid for lesser sins. His supporters
bend over to ameliorate the impact of his misdemeanours. The things
they criticised President Barack Obama for are now justifiable; the
Obama achievements they once downplayed as inconsequential now
matter because Trump achieved similar feats.

Trump supporters, with their fervent devotion to him, mirror
President Muhammadu Buhari’s supporters. By now, we can bet that
Buhari can dagger someone in Wuse market at noon and they will
claim it was necessary to fight corruption. I have come to
understand about Buhari’s supporters by watching Trump’s, and I see
that Trump supporters’ actions can predict Buhari supporters’ too.
No matter how vastly different the two countries and their
democracies may be, there is a fundamental strain in the following
of both men that has transcended space and time. They are
hyper-partisan, and there is no misdemeanour by the president, no
matter its projected impact on democratic institutions, that is
abominable enough to alarm them.

Part of this uncritical devotion has to do with the manner the
electoral victory was won. It was a hard-won contest, one for which
people had to summon their most primal instinct and tribal identity
as a mobilising factor. In the US, it was racism, subtended by
sexism and social anxieties induced by history. In Nigeria, it was
a tribal victory underlined by the All Progressives Congress
propaganda about fighting corruption. Now, with their win in the
bag, these voters find themselves tasked with protecting the
electoral success at the expense of democracy itself. What is at
stake for them is no longer the end goal of democracy – social
flourishing – but holding up their President’s banner as a middle
finger to the other side that was defeated. They have adjusted
their social expectations to match whatever the leader manages to
achieve, and actual dividends of democracy are now considered a
by-product.

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Since Buhari was inaugurated as President, everything that has
gone wrong has been the fault of everyone and everything but
himself. What do his followers say to this? Sai Baba!

When the economy under him tanked, it was not because Buhari
failed to apprehend the complexity of building an economy but
because corruption money was no longer flowing freely. From Boko
Haram to herdsmen and civil conflicts, security under Buhari has
degenerated badly, but his followers will rather live with the
hazards to their own lives than admit he is not getting it right.
Buhari promised to fight corruption, but his government itself has
become a monument to corruption. From party members to the blatant
and incoherent lies this government tells about the progress of
their administration, the entire structure of the APC reeks of
rotting flesh but what does it matter to his followers? They work
hard to convince themselves that what they have is the best it
could get.

Buharism has become a form of pietism, a ritual of religious
devotion that demands a sacrifice of logic and reason in order to
realise itself.

In the past one week, I have watched Buhari’s followers argue
that it does not matter if Buhari’s niece, Amina Zakari, does not
recuse herself from the election in which Buhari has a stake. To
them, there is no conflict of interests even when the interests
involved in the election include that of Buhari. These crusaders
stridently argue that the woman is not central to the electoral
process. Yet, they cannot connect the logic that if she is not
indispensable to the election, it is the more reason she can easily
recuse herself. If the woman herself has a sense of ethics, why is
she so insistent on being a part of the election, letting her
recalcitrance cast aspersions on the process?

Again, the invasion of the Daily Trust by the military alone
should have led to a mass outrage, but we have been so busy fending
off the illogic of Buharists there is not enough energy left to
challenge the arrangement that allows soldiers to invade the media
in broad daylight. They claimed they wanted to invite the pressmen
over to talk about their publication, but why the Abacha-era
invasion style? We should all be worried what these people will do
if they win a second term. They will not only abandon governance;
they will pillage the media and turn other arms of government into
dust.

Nigeria approaches the polls, and the future after February is
pretty gloomy. Any honest person who watched the Buhari interview
with Arise TV would be concerned too. Given Buhari’s poorly
thought-out responses on most issues, we should be bothered if such
a mind can steer the ship of this nation for another four years
without us hitting the rocks. Many people are concerned, most are
not just saying it out. As the Chibuike Amaechi’s “secret” tapes
have shown us, even in private, the APC members know that
corruption is still rife in Nigeria, that social and economic
conditions have declined, and that despite all the cheap
propaganda, Lagos is not working. They know the truth, but it
cannot set them free because they are their own jailers.

The only people who cannot admit the truth to themselves are
Buhari’s followers. I have seen them argue that Buhari’s best
efforts are hampered by due process and he should, therefore,
suspend the constitution. They say it does not matter if the
election was rigged in his favour, and they care less if he uses
public funds to run his campaign. Their ethical thermostat is
regulated by purely partisan sentiments and by now it should be
evident that no rhyme or reason can ever sway them. They have
reposed an identity complex in Buhari and relinquished every desire
of theirs into their single agenda of a Buhari triumph.

This form of tribalism is not new. Since forever, humans have
always tended to descend into tribal formations, but we now live in
an age where the new media has amplified this penchant. Leaders,
aware of this divisiveness in the polity, further muddle the pool.
Their strategy for getting away with their sins is to continuously
appeal to the lowest common denominator that binds their followers’
instincts. From America to Nigeria, tribalism reigns and it brings
out the beast in people. The major difference is that the US is
lucky to have a strong civil society to rein in the president’s
recklessness. Nigeria’s civil society activists who made a lot of
noise during the 16 years of the PDP are now mostly mute, severely
compromised by their entanglements with the APC.

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Five weeks to the election, I no longer think that only Buhari
is the problem that needs to be overcome. We also need to defeat
his voters and the negative energy they pour into the public sphere
to shortchange everyone our due democratic dividends. Because this
tribe of supporters is driven by a primal vigour, they are
untiring, and they exhaust the rest of us who want a debate of
issues that have to do with how democracy will guarantee a better
life for all of us. They let the President get away with a ruinous
attack on institutions, manipulate the representative nature of
democracy to keep the worst of us in power and infect everywhere
with their toxicity. The President, aware of the animosity in the
polity, keeps sowing seeds of discord so that no one will have time
to focus on his failings. Those of us who are interested in a
Nigeria beyond Buhari will have to remain focused and find a way to
argue above – not with – these rabid followers who drag down
everyone with their extreme partisanship support.