Should His Excellency President Olusegun Obasanjo be reelected

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Should His Excellency President Olusegun Obasanjo be reelected?

Max Gbanite

New Jersey, USA

Saturday, March 15, 2003

Democracy as practiced in most civilized nations is about accountability and deliverance of democratic dividends to the masses. The quest for reelection of a public official is based on the candidate’s prior performance, on how s/he kept his promises to the constituents, and on how well he performed while in office. However, Nigeria being a very unusual and unique country, to be elected or reelected to office depends to a very large extent on how much lies you can fabricate to fool the citizens, how much money you have in storage, how much guns, bows/arrows, and knives you have in your arsenal and, above all, how many irresponsible hired thugs, cultists, ex-servicemen, mallams, pastors, crooked lawyers, and even lady killers that are paid and willing to kill and dismember your opponents for you.

I am compelled to present this question to Nigerians as the title suggests. It’s imperative that they should answer with truthfulness and vote His Excellency President Olusegun Obasanjo back to Aso Villa, if he actually deserves to continue. However, if given the situation as it is today in the country they still want him to continue; they then deserve whatever action or inaction they receive from him and all his acolytes. In this case, they have betrayed the nation’s conscience.

General H. Norman Schwarzkopf once said of conscience, “The truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do. The hard part is doing it.” The PDP-led government’s actions have remained incongruent with their mission statement or party manifesto established in 1998. The party seems to be abnegating when challenged to provide concrete evidence of their so-called democratic dividends. Can one truly say that the last four years have been a productive one for the country? Well, as my learned attorney friend posited, he would argue for the return of President Obasanjo, all his federal Ministers, and all PDP incumbent governors because they have kept the country together, especially in the turbulent times of what he referred to as ‘managed chaos.’

Indeed all the violent fracas that has reared its ugly head in almost every state of the federation appears to be highly managed and orchestrated by arranged groups identified since 1999 as subterranean forces and unseen forces by the Honorable Minister of Information, Professor Jerry Gana. The question being asked by many concerned is why these forces have not been arrested? If they are unseen, then they don’t exist. However, if subterranean, why have all the security organs avoided meeting with them? In my opinion, it’s a classic case of perfidious dissemination of information to the country. Professor Gana should be interrogated by the security organs to clearly identify these groups that he alone knows.

On my last trip to Nigeria, I appeared on African Independent Television (AIT) program called ‘KAAKAKI’, and ‘DIPLOMATIC LICENSE’, and also on National Television Authority (NTA) program called ‘PEOPLE AND EVENTS.’ The appearances gave me an opportunity to address the issues confounding the nation, and the many ways to remediate the problems as seen on the ground. For the first time in Nigeria’s history an election as fragile as this one is based on parties and individual monsters, not on issues. Majority of Nigerians, it appears, are very hungry and destitute to the extent that they lack the energy to protest what is happening to them. And those that have the energy are principally identified as opposition and condemned to death by a highly skilled team of assassins paid for by the highest bidder.

When PDP led by President Obasanjo took over the reigns of power in 1999, Nigerians were filled with hope. They were assured that the light at the end of the tunnel was true liberation light. Unfortunately, that light failed to be the liberation light but a light of apocalypse. The light has brought with it government insincerity, ineptitude, incompetence, communal clashes, insecurity to life, political killings, bad governance, and a serious and a realistic possibility of a military takeover.

A strong argument can be made against a military takeover by the intellectuals who do not feel what the masses are feeling and, as righteous as the intellectuals’ position may be, there’s always a classic reasoning that suggests that the best way to stop the military from overtaking civilian government is by doing the right thing for the people being governed and by also improving for the better on all those things the military would use as their reason for coming back. The big question being asked in Nigeria today is, ‘Where is the real democratic dividends’?

If democracy to the masses means freedom to be poor, freedom to be abused, freedom to be killed in communal clashes -- by armed robbers, by untrained police, by brutal soldiers bent on personal vendetta, and by hired killers on the payroll of errant politicians or political parties, freedom to be lied to by their elected government, denial of basic amenities such as constant light, water, the right not to have good federal roads, the right not to have fuel without long lines at the filing stations, the right not to be treated in the hospitals, the rights not to be paid their salaries at the end of the month, and for those in retirement their pensions as when due, and the right not to select and vote for a candidate of their choice during all elections, then kindly take your damn democracy and shove it up your ‘where the sun doesn’t shine.’

Nigerians deserve better than they’ve received under the current dispensation. Those who truly know President Obasanjo believe that he is a good man, and a nationalist par excellence, but I have always maintained that he surrounded himself with ‘useful idiots.’ Most if not his entire ministers (ministers of state inclusive) and his advisers are devastatingly corrupt to the highest level. If you give them the Holy Bible/Koran to swear to that effect, they would capitulate like a deck of cards. If he Obasanjo is mistakenly re-elected by all means necessary (rigging, of course), he should drop these men/women of dishonor.

STATE OF THE NATION:

Nigeria as of now is under a heightened state of insecurity and inefficiency. Those in government who are sincere would readily admit that the budgetary allocations since 1999 to date have not been implemented. The question being asked fervently without any answer forthcoming is where did the money go, and what was the money used for? It was an astitute and brilliant thinker like Mr. Azie, the since-removed acting auditor general -- a man with audacity and true national character, who revealed to the people what happened to their money. It cost him his job and, the connoisseur of transparency, President Obasanjo, did not like what his advisers and ministers had to say about the method with which Mr. Azie revealed their hidden information to the people. He asked that the man be removed on the pretence that his six months as acting auditor-general is up. What a real screw up, as Americans would say. One would think that in the interest of transparency and good governance and in the interest of the anti-corruption crusade, as Obasanjo and his ever so corrupt cabinet and advisers constantly rave, that a man like Mr. Azie should be confirmed as the auditor-general and even given a national merit award. Instead the same government is wasting time and energy attacking lame-duck legislators for amending the Independent Corrupt Practices Act (ICPC). What a damn shame!

The National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) is now in an advanced state of decay and inefficiency in discharging its responsibilities to the nation, even with an infusion of billions of naira. I can attest that during my stay in Abuja, the light was always out at 6:00 AM, and comes back at 8:00 PM daily for sixty days. In some parts of the country, power was off for days and weeks, yet Obasanjo keeps telling the world that NEPA’s inefficiency is a thing of the past. The good thing about NEPA is that they are an equal opportunity non-provider of light. They even snuffed out the light from the Presidential Villa; ministers suffer similar embarrassment. So NEPA has indeed lived up to their popular acronym: Never Expect Power Always! More disturbing is that NEPA has crippled industrial production and inflicted a serious damage on the psyche on citizens.

The issue of insecurity is a true shame to Obasanjo’s administration. The whole world knows of Chief Marshall Harry’s death. He was a wonderful man and a pillar of politics in the country, a man I remember meeting couple of weeks ago at a mutual friend’s house in Abuja. I remember my telling him that his ANPP lack the prevailing capacity to defeat PDP at the polls and his enthusiastic answer and assurance that ANPP would indeed defeat PDP, if not nationally but definitely in Rivers State. What a treacherous game Nigerian politics has turned into. I remember my article of November 20, 2001 titled ‘Intimidation + Gangsterism = PDP Democracy’ published by kwenu.com and gamji.com. In the article I detailed what the PDP led government is doing to those opposed to them.

Even before Chief Marshall’s death, my classmate in primary and secondary schools and a good second-generation friend, Senatorial candidate for Orlu, Mr. Ogbonnaya Uche suffered the same fate. The names of the fallen reads like the American Baseball Hall of Fame. Yet the PDP government led by President Obasanjo has failed to address this issue as a national disaster, one capable of truncating their reelection ambitions. They simply render lip service to these killings. As a matter of fact, a PDP stalwart (name withheld for now) referred to the deaths as collateral damage consequenced by unprepared democracy. Most State police commissioners have become so biased and corrupted by state governors to the extent that it is alleged that the police rent their uniforms and service rifles to political thugs doing the bidding of these corrupt governors. They intimidate with share brutality and reckless abandon.

Obasanjo once wrote that “man is a contradiction, a complex being, and a unique animal. One side of man shows his ingenuity: His humanness, his creative capacity and his capacity to be kind, loving and to acknowledge and honour the truth. This is the divine aspect of man. The other face shows man using his ability, capability and ingenuity maliciously, devilishly, and oppressively. This is the satanic aspect of man.”

Man, is he so right about himself and his actions since he assumed office!

One cannot really blame the police. They lack the tools to fight crimes. A typical visit to any police station will show you that the complainant provides even the pens used to write the complaints, and he is even told to pay for the notebook used in the process. The policeman is made to pay for his uniforms, shoes, belts, and his rent is deducted from his pay. Those who have been promoted for over a year are still receiving salaries based on their old ranks. Morale is very low; therefore, he is compelled to seek additional income to supplement the inadequacy of improper funding by government.

The military is not spared. Some senior officers have not received their salaries in the past three months. However, the junior officers, and rank and file are paid with only a month arrears. This definitely doesn’t augur well for security.

All the federal roads that I had the opportunity to travel on in the North, Middle-Belt, West, East, and South-South are all in a state of deplorable condition and most had big signs that read, “MEN AT WORK”; however, the men were all missing with their equipment due to lack of payment. The same government continues to tell the people that it has appropriated over three hundred and sixty billion naira through the federal ministry of works to tackle these bad roads that are nicknamed ‘death traps’ by the locals. Where did the three hundred and sixty billion naira go ?

The cost of living has increased astronomically to a level unheard of before in the country’s agricultural history. Transportation is equally very high and unaffordable, except for those under the protection of PDP “umbrella” logo. The rest are soaking in abject poverty. Students of federal universities have not seen the four walls of classrooms in months. And we wonder from whence the corrupt politicians recruit daredevil thugs and hired assassins and outright hoodlums.

Corruption is still the best game in town. The revenue mobilization commission presented evidence showing that NNPC is defrauding the country to the tune of three hundred billion naira every year since 1999, but Justice Akanbi is waiting for the President to teleguide him to investigate. The INEC ballot boxes are being constructed in China of all places without competitive bidding.

Nigerians are in constant consternation of PDP led administration. There are many more things wrong with this government of PDP, and even to some extent the ANPP and AD-led governments that crave the return of the military in the hearts of Nigerians.

The ugliest part of this democracy is that people are not quite sure what to do or in what direction the country is drifting. Some people are skeptical if the election would hold on April 19. Some feel that INEC have been shortchanged by the President, while others feel that corruption has permeated INEC to the extent that they are incapable of holding a fair election bereft of rigging.

Violence has already been demonstrated to its highest level that nothing can stop it now. As a matter of fact, it’s soundly believed and alleged within some high-ranking PDP stalwarts that the party has been sponsoring a killing machine group fashioned after the late General Sani Abacha’s ‘strike force’ headed by a retired notorious brigadier-general.

The question Nigerians both in Nigeria and abroad should be asking then is: given the true performance of President Obasanjo, his Ministers, and Governors, do they deserve a return to office just for the sake of euphemistic continuity; or, should other presidential candidates and their parties be given a chance? I have always said, and I will continue to say it, that the only person capable of defeating the Obasanjo/Atiku ticket and the PDP-led no-performance government is His Excellency General Ibrahim Babangida. As a matter of fact, had he agreed to come out, the future that Nigeria is looking for would be brighter. Now, Nigerians have to be prepared for the uncertainty that may befall the country after the elections.

Continuity, in most cases, is based on one’s track record in doing what is right for his constituency. In the case of Nigeria, should President Obasanjo and his Governors be reelected to continue exacting this devastation on Nigeria as evidenced in the last four years, or should they be reelected to restore the country from the devastation inflicted by them, or should they be reelected just for the mere reasoning of safeguarding democracy from the military -- which remains a pipedream? These are questions that beg for answers and, come May 29^th 2003, the people of Nigeria will eventually get what they asked for, be it by rigging, coercion, or by act of God; they will surely get it.

As the current United States Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Howard Jeter postulated when taking questions from reporters on 2003 elections, “Will the process be peaceful? Will the new government have a vision of a new Nigeria? Will the government make provisions for a safe and secure environment? The world is watching.”

Oh yes, the whole world is watching!