A CASE FOR A DEMOCRATIC AUDIT OF NIGERIA

By

Mike Ikhariale

The 41^st anniversary celebration of the nation’s independence from colonial Britain which took place on the first day of the month of October 1960 has provided us with yet another opportunity for the ritualistic appraisal of our checkered journey into nationhood and the inevitable taking of the proverbial stocks of our individual and collective fortunes within this national continuum. This piece, commemorative as it is, is also an attempt to set certain verifiable standards and limits in the inevitable process of national political accounting with a view to making those who steer the ship of state to be fairly and undeniably culpable for deficiencies traceable directly to their managerial delict as against the present obfuscation created by the a lousy assessment mechanism which often creates some cheap loopholes for those who ought to be facing the hangman for their crimes associated with national ruination. In other words, there ought to be no reason for those who are guilty by their actions be ‘technically’ escaping justice due to nothing but clearly defective accusations or as they say in law, imprecise and inappropriate charges.

We have witnessed in Nigeria an incredible situation in which every past leader tries to glibly rationalize his failure in office by indecently passing the buck to his predecessors or in some outrageous instances, actually turn around to blame the Nigerian people as the cause and source of their own immiseration! For example, Babangida continues to insult the intelligence of victimized Nigerians of his locust invaded years by saying that his reign was the best that the nation ever had. Before him, we had a character like Gowon who continued to say that his administration was the most focused in the history of the country. It would not be impossible to hear tomorrow that the Abacha’s regime was the most benevolent in the annals of this nation, which Lugard, in his colonial wisdom, assembled. All these ambulatory insults are possible simply because these past usurpers have come to observe that a very defective appraisal process is being applied in judging them: form as against substance, convenience as against legitimacy, sentiments instead of concrete and verifiable indices. For example, in our judgmental exercise, we seem to have habitually confused growth with development, progress with propaganda, planned development with chance happenings, etc.

It is in the order of nature that there must always be a form of growth, be it positive or negative, and none is imperative or even accidental. On the contrary, development has to be a deliberate rational undertaking, a vision translated into reality by those who are privileged to be at the helms. However, a leader under whose reign the overall well being of his people plummeted well below imagination ought not to be heard talking about success or legacy like the noises we hear these days. Unfortunately, our leaders’ sense of well-being is how far they have multiplied their personal fortune while in power and how many billion Naira contracts they awarded to lubricate the patronage machine while in office, not caring whether those billions of Naira actually translated into anything beneficial to the generality of the people. And to some citizens, the good leader is the one who hails from their own clan, group or faith, irrespective of how negligible he actually improved on their lives. Nonsense! The good leader must be that one who places national interests over and above his personal or sectional interest, a statesman par excellence. When we discuss development, for example, we all know today that the federal government is building a financially mammoth stadium in Abuja whose utility can never match the huge opportunity cost to the nation. Expectedly, some people are indeed defending it as furiously as possible just for their selfish reasons. To those individuals who initiated and are pushing for that drainpipe of a project, it is one of their evidence of ‘development’. Is not high time now that we started to ask them: qui bono?

A man comes into public office and proceeds through all his actions and omissions to weaken the structural and conceptual cohesiveness of the polity than he met it, and upon leaving office by whatever route available, either pushed out or killed off, would still have the audacity to say that he has done his best for the nation without telling what constitute his ‘best’. For example, we all know that Nigeria was, in all respects, more united in 1959 than it is today. There seem to be a geometric parallel between the territorial sub-division of the country into three as existed in 1959 to thirty-six today and national cohesion. Yet, it has become a standard refrain by our past dictatorial rulers to sing that they only held on to power endlessly in order to preserve the territorial integrity and unity of the Republic. But the situation on the ground points to a different direction as far as unity is concerned. For example, before these leaders, we did not have to contend with either the serpent of religious violence nor the tiger of ethnic intolerance, much less the atomic bomb of poverty and institutionalized unequal access to national resources as acute as they are now.

In spite of all we have said, there are evidence that Obasanjo may also have for himself a wide escape route for his actual and perceived failings because Nigerians, the press in particular, have started to use the same wrong criteria they have always used to judge those before him which we have already explained as wholly misleading. It is even quite easy for him to deploy this weapon of evasion, himself being a key participant in an earlier illegitimate regime. As matter of fact, in our haste to criticize, we often make it easy for those we seek to criticize to laugh away feeling perfectly all right simply because they easily notice that we are focusing on the wrong items for performance appraisal. Buhari for example, boasts that he brought "discipline" to a wayward nation; IBB in turn would beat his chest of the "human rights" he promoted among our enslaved people. Abacha would probably have boasted that he "stabilized" a turbulent economy and society. We all know that these people could as well have been singing their various tunes to the marines as far as these fraudulent claims are concerned. To promote discipline in a dictatorship must be a euphemism for intimidation or pacification, while to promote human rights in it may well be the very definition of anarchy. All the same, these dictators make these bogus claims rather casually.

These illegitimate dictatorial rulers tended to run away with these irresponsibly scandalous clinches mainly because the society unwittingly abandoned the real issues of development and the fundamental principles in our nation-ness and wrongly fixed its gaze at the ephemerality and formalism of "growth" or even no growth at all, in most cases! In other words, we do not audit our political process scrupulously. In the process, we have succeeded in confusing banditry with governance. Working from the first principle of our nationhood as articulated in the articles of the Union, it is clear that only Balewa, Shagari and, now, Obasanjo that have responsibly and lawfully ascended national leadership in Nigeria in all of forty-one years. The others have been political criminals and treasonable pretenders who, in strict sense of national constitutional governance, cannot properly be characterized as leaders. In the same vane, attempting to assess their performance in office by using indices of civilized governance would only inflict logical absurdity on our analyses. How on earth did we expect to develop when the essence of the polity’s constitutional democracy was held in abeyance, or to use their preferred term, "suspended"? To put it mildly, the national process also stopped, stumbled and fell when these rascals shot their way into office and seized power while we watched in complete amazement. One fact that has struck me in my little studies, so far, is that woe betides a people who had had their national soul put aside in the name of military governance. The evidence are many. From Somalia, through Ethiopia, to Liberia, across Nigeria and via the Congo unto Afghanistan, dictatorial military rulership only succeeded in pushing national development into extinction or permanent hibernation. Therefore, serious chroniclers of the national process are welcome into the reality and warning signs of never to confuse national leadership with military banditry, which is what we got while the soldiers held sway in our country.

It is then paramount, and indeed critical, that we maintain that functional distinction between governance and banditry per se, whenever we compare regimes, vis-à-vis their performances while in office. Without the expense of serious research, it is almost self-evident that the nostalgia of our people for the good old days relate only to those brief periods of democratic constitutional governance; it is only those few conspiratorial beneficiaries of the evil system of military banditry, where popular democratic governance is forcibly replaced by cloak and dagger militics, who would continue to hold some blurred dream about the return of the old days of unmitigated vandalism in the face of the devastation now on the land--hunger, disease, violence, fraud, and other untold miseries, which are the natural fruits of their usurpation. That is why the generality of the citizenry should be mindful of the way and manner they judge those who ‘lead’ them.

Expectedly, some Nigerians, within the specific context of a regime-type evaluation, have started to ask themselves if the operators of the present regime are not once again taking them on a yo-yo ride. This basically skeptical posturing, ordinarily, is a very healthy disposition in a democracy: the citizen’s right to demand routine accountability from those vested with the national stewardship. And against the background of our recent experiences with mindless dictatorship, wherein oppression and corruption held sway, one is more inclined to attribute the endless refrain on the land these days which is generally centered around whether or not our lives are better now than in the years before the new dispensation came on board, to the unfortunate national experience—once bitten twice shy. Even with that concession, the point could still be made that there is really no rational basis to begin to compare the ‘new deal’ as represented by the presidency of President Obasanjo with the evil dictatorial contraptions as typified by the past roguish leadership of Abacha or Babangida. Of course, it is often pointed out that the personnel have hardly changed, just new wine in old bottles in spite of the new philosophy. I contend that there is a difference, not just the freedom to express oneself, but the knowledge and the awareness that the government derives its legitimacy from the will of the voters. In real terms, it is like comparing light with darkness.

It is therefore important that analysts and commentators of public affairs in Nigeria confine themselves within the logical parameters of comparing likes with likes. While it is true that the President himself drew the first blood by declaring that Nigeria is a lot better today than it were two years ago, it is however way off the target by replying him that the nation is in anyway worse off today. Evidence on the ground point to the contrary. In strict developmental terms, only a truly blind person can assert that nothing positive has occurred in Nigeria since the coming into being of the Obasanjo presidency.

Perhaps we have reached the stage for the purpose of this discourse where I must make my disclaimer and establish my standing, so to say, pursuant to the point I am about making, namely, that Nigeria is certainly better today than it were in the evil days of dictatorship. First, I happen to be an unrepentant democratic constitutionalist who can hardly countenance any political arrangement predicated on any other principle other than that based on the Will of the People. Military dictatorship only serves to remind me of the notorious roadside Ore mechanics who ambushed unlucky motorists along the busy but poorly maintained Lagos-Benin Highway and would rather drop your entire vehicle engine and completely immobilize you to their own advantage just to replace your bad spark plugs! Two, I do not hold Obasanjo’s brief in any capacity but I strongly believe that Nigerians should do everything possible to consolidate on the gains of the new democracy because, judging from the depth we are coming from, running a democracy is by itself a big leap forward for the country. That does not in any way translates into thinking that democracy is the end of governance, rather, my intention is to argue that it is however a very effective and verifiable means to some positive end or what the late sage, Awolowo, would refer to as "life more abundantly".

Therefore, the correct question that should be asked, in my considered opinion, ought to be: Would Nigeria have been better off than it is today, giving the resources available to this government? In other words, is it not possible for Nigerians to have benefited more from the dividends of democracy than they are getting today? These are the pertinent questions that properly relate to the reality of our transitory democracy. But asking the people to be comparing the Obasanjo regime with those of the dictators of the past is not only unproductive, politically speaking, it is also tendentious, as it is unwittingly putting on the floor the incongruous choice between a democracy and a dictatorship, between good and evil, or any other form of government, for that matter. We know that couldn’t have been an honest proposition at all as it effectively shields the government from a sustainable charge or scrutiny in the light of the new constitutional environment which itself is predicated on the theory of the sovereignty of the People as against the dominance of a czar totting a rifle over my head. An effective democratic audit therefore must be one carried out in which we compare achievements against set achievable standards within the parameters of the constitution presently in force.

Good enough, it is really no longer very difficult to tell, perhaps really never was, whether or not a society is making sustainable progress. Certain socio-political determinants have come very handy in assessing the developmental status of the individual political society. A more popularly used indicators are those formulated under the UNDP Human Development Index (HDI) which attempt to deploy fairly objective criteria for measuring progress in societal management. This is a simple form of national balance sheets making in which scientific rankings of nations are drawn. Special attention is paid to items like life expectancy, nutrition, literacy level and statistics of enrollment into school, be they primary, secondary, and tertiary levels of education, human rights and the level of social justice in the society and several other objective variables. The pity of it all is that based on these criteria, our dear nation, Nigeria, has for several years in the recent past performed very poorly even well behind many countries that do not have fractions of our resources. That is hardly surprising as the nation was under the strangled-hold of mindless dictatorship during these periods, a situation that firmly placed the developmental vehicle on the rapid reverse gear.

Certain things have since changed for the better for the country since May 1999, even though gradually. If we must fairly tackle the Obasanjo system, it would be more constructive to do so by checking him on those objective items that impact meaningfully on the developmental capacity of the nation. For example, it would be helpful to compare his achievements in the area of education against what was possible. In this connection, we should be verifying whether we now have more of our children in school than before; have our hospitals moved up from being mere consulting clinics to life-saving edifices; do we now have more telephones lines than we had before and at rates that are more competitive; are the roads better now than they were before; are letters reaching their destinations faster and safer today than before; has the embarrassing gap between the rich and the poor bridged, if so, is it at the rate commensurate to our productivity; are personal liberties being protected now as against the reign of terror of the past; how much of freedom expression do we now enjoy and what is the quality of knowledge that our free expression can convey; what is the standing of Nigeria in the comity of nations today; is she still a pariah, etc., etc.?

Of course, it remains the prerogatives of competing political groups to sell their programmes on a cost-benefit format. In other words, it is perfectly legitimate for the political opponents of the regime to want to convince the Nigerian electorate that they would have been able to achieve and even surpass whatever achievements the present government has made and at a rate that is both more cost efficient and socially justifiable as far as equitable distribution is concerned, namely, the greatest good to the greatest number or the so-called ‘felicity calculus’. What I think is not proper in our circumstance is to simply declare that life is worse today than it was in the years preceding the advent of democracy even if it has actually become tough for a few that previously lived the easy sinecure life nor seek to predicate such conclusions on the ground that some unpatriotic people are misusing the new system to their selfish ends. The correct thing to do, in the context of democratic auditing, is to point out those people abusing the system and isolate them for proper punishment. To do otherwise might be throwing away the Baby with the bath water because one of the first law of dictatorship is to snatch from the people the basis of life itself, namely, self-determination, which then denies them the privilege to even talk of their lives getting better or worse.

As I disclaimed at the beginning, I do not speak for the Obasanjo regime but we all owe it as a duty to our country that we insist that we criticise fairly and rationally too. I am aware that politics will not be worth much if it does not go with mudslinging, refined or crude. But it would also be a huge mistake to take it as a license to wish away everything that came with democracy all in the name of point scoring. For example, the inhabitants of Lagos and Delta states do not need elaborate statistics to be convinced that things have partially gone for the better in their domains. These administrations are fogging on with policies that seek to attack the substratum of the people’s suffering. The same could be happily said in some other states. There is also the self-evident reality that some leaders have used the opportunity of democracy to set their people back, developmentally speaking, all in the guise of religion and other bane political considerations.

The bottom line is that democracy is good and, indeed, productive if faithfully implemented. All indications are that we are not making the best use of our democratic machine. That to me is the critical issue for debate. Perhaps the real beauty of the system is in its enduring capacity for self-correction and the competitiveness of the input. This is better manifested in the choice it offers the citizens during periodic elections. If however that possibility were frustrated or covertly truncated, the seed for its self-destruction would begin to germinate as we have seen in the past. Therein lie the important question of party registration and the process of just and orderly succession within the current experiment. Today, there is the debate whether or not the nation should have more parties and there are evidence that some miscreants are working hard to frustrate the emergence of additional parties. These are the real enemies of Nigeria. One of the key dividends of our inchoate democracy would be its capacity to propagate and sustain democratic ideals. Shenanigans designed to avoid more parties are signs that those who run the system do not appreciate the enormous responsibility placed on their shoulders to see to it that this democracy project succeeds, develops and endures.

The new electoral law being proposed by the Senate is a time bomb that must be diffused before it hits its target. It is obvious that there is no good faith in the reordering of the voting procedure which stipulates that the presidential election shall be held first before the other lesser political offices. We know that there was the other patriotic suggestion that all these elections be held on the same day so as to avoid all negative influences of stampede and intimidation but the Senate committee which was vested with this task roundly failed the nation by selling out to vested interests at the expense of the polity. Put simply, the motive is to generate the so-called bandwagon effect after the presidential election. But knowing the internal dynamics of our succession politics, rather than reaping undeserved electoral benefits therefrom, the scheme could indeed boomerang to create a political catastrophe of unimaginable proportions for all, winners and losers alike, because this arrangement if followed through could create the rare incident of legislative rigging, a veritable whirlwind that may blow no good for both the initiators and the intended victims. I have always argued that in the context of national politics in Nigeria, not all that is possible is probable. That is a party of our history. A certain matured level of give and take is necessary for us at all times in order to successfully navigate this tight political corner in the aftermath of many years in the political wilderness. The pertinent question is, "would they listen?"

How Obasanjo resolves this budding problem may well be the acid test as to whose side he is on: the nation or his selfish interest. At his age and circumstance, I want to believe that he would do the right thing and jettison that obnoxious legislative initiative to torpedo the electoral process by some deranged senators. Perhaps this subject requires a special treatment in another essay, given its intricate constitutionalism and relevance to all that democracy may ultimately become in Nigeria. Suffice it to say, however, that this is for operators of the new democracy, one booby trap too many. Consequently, those who are interested in auditing the current national politics of the Republic should be begin to focus on those of its activities that has the capacity to undermine the whole project of democracy in Nigeria, because, it is only in the context of a stable and properly functioning constitutional democracy and a cohesive nation that any meaningful progress could be made in the direction of sustainable national development. The surest safeguard for this is a succession contrivance that is not only fair but also seen to be truly so without let or hindrance. I think Nigerians are experienced enough in this regard.

As I mentioned earlier on, the Obasanjo government, within the context of a democracy, might be making some progress. What I cannot tell is how much. True enough, the government has not been able to prove itself as a winning one even in the face of the remarkable strides it has made in some area of real development. It is not enough to harp on the dividends of democracy, ad infinitum. It is equally important that this message be packaged in ways that bring out the substance of these dividends. The best way to do this, in my humble opinion, is to be open, transparent and trust that the people are not too dumb to think for themselves. There is still evidence that the government does not take the people into confidence. This condescending disposition is a negative carryover from the dictatorial days of the military when every bohemian colonel thought himself a philosopher and the generality of the people, including real philosophers, were taken as mere pawns to be rudely manipulated at will. I should think that things have changed, should change, and must change with the advent of democracy and that the era of openness has arrived for the country. Without beating about the bush on this issue, given our peculiar situation, it should be obvious that the ability to energize and sustain the momentum of our democracy through a pluralistic approach to the political game as evidenced by the ease of mass participation through simplified party formation and, if necessary, liquidation, may well be the most valuable asset in the nation’s political Balance Sheet, far more important than all the propaganda currently on display by all the participants.

Massachusetts, MA

October 2001