BABANGIDA AGAIN?
By
Mike Ikhariale
The perennial recalcitrance and Lucifer-like incorrigibility that indelibly define both the moral and political profile of the gap-toothed Minna based retired General once again came into bold relief for all who cared to behold a few days ago. The place was the high plateau city of Jos and the occasion was during a-three day politically incestuous seminar organized by notable henchmen and cronies of the inglorious Babangida military junta, arrogantly dubbed "The Babangida Regime: Problems and Perspective of Interpretation". The apparent motive for the congregation of these people of little honor was to panel-beat the fundamentally dented image of the expired dictator on the erroneous assumption that Nigerians forget quite easily. On this mission, Babangida and his cohorts failed woefully as the nation, excepting their fellow travelers on the road to perdition, haven been so badly beaten on several ‘maradonic’ occasions, and in consequence lost confidence in everything about him, only held their noses in the air all in utter contempt.
If however there was anyone who still faintly harbored any doubt about the personal culpability of General Ibrahim Gbadamosi Babangida (retired) in the grievous, prolonged and continued ruination of the Nigerian nation, such has now been dissipated, given the arrant self-glorification and illusion of grandeur which pervaded the shameless and crooked theme of the Jos rendezvous. From all indications, the man is unrepentant, a sure measure of his limited intellectual acuity, for it takes a thoroughly refined mind to appreciate the virtue of penitence. And when a man of such depraved testimonial and without any iota of honor goes ahead to proclaim that for ‘your tomorrow he is giving his today’, safely take notice that he will be stealing both your today and tomorrow as IBB has general tragically thought Nigerians.
By the words of his own mouth, the ex-Dictator General has unwittingly admitted personal responsibility for the messy outcome of his illegitimate stewardship but due to his characteristically shallow moral constituent, failed woefully to obtain any possible mitigation from the inevitable harsh judgment of history simply because he could not demonstrate sufficient penitence for his high crimes. Unlike the statesman he forever pretends to be, he remains crudely adamant even in the face of the damning evidence of history: he failed. Consequently, several years on, he stands perpetually condemned for his crass and stupendous culpability and, no doubt, with an aggravated penalty. Babangida’s transgression against the Nigerian polity is so grievous that it cannot be so easily wished away as the Jos conferees would want us believe. What took place during his reign, is not just a case of a mere politically defective judgment or an unexpected failure of a bona fide policy, but one of willful and premeditated treasonable ruination of the collective dream of the polity propelled largely be greed and megalomania. What took place was indeed a crime beyond pardon, for its impact and ramifications irretrievably affected and continue to affect the substratum of the Nigerian social order.
The prevailing frustration and resultant division in the land today is the outcome of his misadventure. Here is a man who craved greatness even thought he was not meant to be. His misguided ‘social engineering’ experimentation only turned out phenomena like OPC, APC and the like. Psychiatrists may, hopefully, someday tell the world what went on in the man’s brain. Until then, his evil ingenuity will continue to set him part from the rest of the enlightened and moral human society, the same forum in which he so greedily hanker after for some attention even with blood dripping implicatively from his hands. For a soldier who shot his way into government only to adopt the title "president" was the very first indication that the guy has something up his sleeves. The real legacy of Babangida is that after him, the political entity known as Nigeria lost her capacity to hold out as one united and indivisible polity as was initially intended by those who brought the Union into existence; the spirit of the nation waned and its potentials for progress deemed terminally. In other words, the Republic became an empty shell devoid of any substance, what with the earlier verdict passed on the regime by the Gideon Orka led junior putsch of 1990, the nullification of the June 12 election which nearly gave the federation the degrading toga of a failed state. People can not so easily forget that whatever evil Abacha subsequently perfected, economic and political, pales into mere footnote when compared to the great opportunities that came Babangida’s way which were dissipated by his pathological predisposition to do evil. Feeling cool behind the hills of Jos, the man unrepentantly said and to the slavish applause of his cronies, "I take full responsibility" for the annulment of the June 12 elections as if he was talking about a broken glass of water. The truth is that the man was glibly talking about that same transgression that had seen the nation debilitated with valuable national assets and human lives in ruins. As if he was in a trance, he went on to add that he "expected the understanding and magnanimity of fellow citizens."
One would have thought that after such a prolonged silence over the June 12 misdemeanor, Babangida would have had time to reflect and recollect some of his lost humanity and apologize to the nation like any decent and reformed person. No. The man was still to taunt Nigerians with his tortuous ingenuity. Hear him: "our initiative did not die. When the time was ripe, democracy emerged upon our nation stronger and finer than we had expected" and that "the sacrifice made by Nigerian have been fully rewarded". Defiantly, he added that "I am happy too that our vision for which I had invested all my energy and for which I had tasked my colleagues even beyond endurance has been fulfilled." Is that Babangida? What an illusion? So, the man continues to dream of himself as a political super star? Is Babangida now also among the prophets? That man should continue to thank his stars that no real positive changes have taken place in Nigeria since the failed Orka coup. There is this folk saying that the young man whose palm kernel has been struck for him by a benevolent spirit should not forget to be humble. That the present Obasanjo regime is a part of his reputed political investment should not give him cause to think that all is over. The General ought to know that it is not over until is all over because a Pharaoh could still appear that may have no business with Joseph. It is therefore definitely too early to gloat.
Here was a man who knew how best to engaged some of the good and credible intellectuals of Nigeria manpower to accomplish his devilish schemes. If evil was the goal, the man scored a bulls eye. Not well educated himself, and if standards had been evenly maintained in military recruitment, was physically too short to enlist into the Nigerian Army, he was however street-wise enough to spot people with adequate cerebral power and went for them, courted them and finally initiating them into his team. Like those animals that went to see the Lion in his den when he pretended to be ill, none of them came out unscathed: they were all baptized or co-opted into corruption of monumental proportions or ‘settled’ beyond the redemption of their consciences as was then in the parlance of the junta, and as a result, they all left their credibility behind in the General’s dining table. This corrupting power of Babangida and, to some extent, Abacha, has led to the unfortunate situation where Nigeria now has an acute shortage of honest and credible intellectuals.
Common sense and political decency should have told IBB that he has forfeited his political locus standi in the people’s court. Instead he is boasting. Flaunting his ill-gotten wealth as if the term "treasury looting" was invented only for the late General Abacha, who, by the way, was only his faithful disciple-in-crime. Just when people were wondering what has come over IBB over his Jos misspeak, he again opened his mouth wide, this time, on the Hausa service of the VOA to say that "it is seven years after the annulment of June 12 presidential election, yet people keep on asking me about it, in spite of the sufficient answers I have given". Not done yet, he added "you will discover that it is just a group of people who feel aggrieved by the annulment of June 12 election". And as if that was his Marshall Plan for Nigeria, he queried, "if there were not for the annulment, where would they have been today? ... June 12 has served as a key that opened the door for many Nigerians in position of authority today". Sufficient answers indeed. Are we to understand him to mean that but of the June 12 annulment the year 2000 would never have come to Nigeria?
That may be the limits of his understanding of the tragedy he recklessly inflicted on the nation, but to millions of Nigerians, whose lives have been needlessly destroyed by the immediate and lingering aftermath of June 12, he must be living in another world. The assessment of the General’s Jos booboo was aptly captured by the CLO, a human rights organization that should know, when it scored him thus: "In all aspects of human rights, whether in the muzzling of the press, Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Nigeria Medical Association (NMA), student unionism, he destroyed all the vibrant and viable institutions of democracy. Even the ECOMOG operations were designed as a scheme to rescue his friends late Samuel Doe. He later transformed it into a conduit pipe to siphon funds into private pockets. It was under Babangida that 419, drug trafficking, even human prostitution became visible problems." That is the man who is still boasting about legacy. Such could only happen in the Nigeria of today, certainly nowhere else.
When for too long the General refused to speak, many thought that he was bidding his time. Now that he has opened his mouth, it is clear that it was all due to a failure of ideas. He has already been found guilty in the court of the people, one reason why he would need a six million Naira security cover to walk the street of Lagos alive. Neither dares him even to look at the Niger Delta page on the map. Like the foolish convict, he failed to make a credible allocutus hence he is scheduled for an aggravated punishment. If he is till in any doubt, let him consult his lawyers.
Mike Ikhariale is a Professor of Law at Harvard University Law School