What president Obasanjo can and should do to survive
by
This is the third in the series of papers on the legitimacy crisis facing President Obasanjo in the face of the decision of the northern political leaders to withdraw the support of the north from the President. In the first paper I discussed the hold of the north on the President before he became the nominee of the PDP and eventually the President in 1999. The second paper dealt with the new agenda of the north, which is to force the President out of office because he had as Alhaji Shagari put in 'Obasanjo had abused the trust of the north'.
This third paper shall be dealing with how the President could and should survive in the face of the threatened withdrawal of support by the Arewa leaders and force him out of office now or before or at the end of one term.
There is nothing wrong if he was made the lackey of the north at any stage; but what is important is what he does with the position of the President of Nigeria sworn to do justice for the whole country and not for the north alone. What is at issue is whether the President would be acting as the lackey of the North in office or whether he would act as the true representative of Nigeria committed to the resolution of the lingering political problems afflicting the country? This is the crisis facing President Obasanjo today as he contemplates how to cope with the problems posed by the Arewa Consultative Forum and the Committee of former Heads of State. The problems posed by the north are of two kinds.
First, the President should publicly acknowledge that there is a new agenda of the north within the old agenda of permanent northern rule, which is against the national interest and which is against the oath he swore to on May 29, 1999.
Second, the President should device ways to cope with the new manifestations of the old agenda by allying himself with Nigerians.
The initial problem of the President is that he is alone. He is afraid to openly associate himself with those who could help him to devise a new strategy of coping with the new agenda of the north. The northern political leaders are scared whenever non-northerners are found around President Obasanjo offering him advice on the way forward and the president needs all hands on deck very badly. Unfortunately, those who are the President's advisers are card-carrying members of the Arewa Consultative Forum. Some of them are known nominees of the former Heads of State, specifically of Generals Babangida, while others are the left over of the administration of Generals Abacha and Abubakar. We saw how the President was misled over the Sharia issue and his security advisers were able to place before the President, the security situation in the north before it exploded. What should president Obasanjo do? If I were approached to offer advice, I would urge President Obasanjo to undertake the following immediate actions:
QUESTIONS NIGERIANS CAN AND SHOULD ASK?
Nigerians should frame the debate from some pertinent questions arising from the assertions of the Arewa Consultative forum and the Committee of the former Heads of State. Consequently
The foregoing questions are pertinent for obvious reason. If the northern leaders have to regret the outcome of the exercise, which produced President Obasanjo, Nigerians have right to demand what the northern leaders would do, if the outcome of the next election grows out of the 'will of the Nigerian voters'.
It is a matter of common sense and the northern political leaders should appreciate this that the next President after President Obasanjo would not be a northerner and would not be another Obasanjo they would force on the Nigerian people only to be blackmailed later. The southern political leaders are the wiser for it and would watch out for any attempt of the north to engineer a southerner and a lackey of the Arewa Consultative Forum. Nigerian are on the look out for any candidate who would be committed solely to further the wishes of the former Heads of State. Certain questions are pertinent.
I am raising the foregoing questions because I know what I am talking about. I saw the anti-democratic plan unfold in 1993; I lived through the process of its unfolding and almost lost my life in the aftermath. The critical question is whether Nigeria will survive another election in the light of the threat of the north that the north would produce the President in 2003 and the determination of the southern political leaders to resist it and in fact have a candidte or candidates of their own? We are at that stage now.
Nigerians should look back and reflect on how the same northern leaders calling themselves the Arewa Consultative Forum today told the military President that they did not want Chief MKO Abiola, because he had the support of his people and would be supported by his people while in government.
Nigerians should reflect on how the retired military officers made the political leaders of the north to gamble with the making of General Obasanjo a President in 1999 on the erroneous belief that the Yorubas did not like him from his past. They were under the mistaken notion that General Obasanjo as President, would consult them before making any appointment or before making any policies. Certainly they expect the President to consider the north before the Yoruba or before any other groups in Nigeria in all that he would be doing as the President. Because he is failing to do this the Arewa Consultative Forum and the Committee of the former Heads of State are planning to remove him. Failure which they are planning to use the National Assembly to obstruct him and run the clock on the President. They want to make sure that in the process the President might not be able to get something done before the end of the only term approved for him by them.
Nigerians should not forget that all the members of the Committee of the former Heads of State did not only support the annulment, they did everything to cover-up the issues arising out of the annulment. They actively supported the dictator, General Sani Abacha until death as in furtherance of the 'one north', 'one people' and 'one destiny'. Some were even on General Abacha's pay roll and some served as his foreign envoy.
Nigerians should know that not one of the former Heads of State even made a case for the eminent member of their club, General Obasanjo when General Abacha descended on him in 1995 and when he even plotted to eliminate him in the Yola prison in the north. I was surprised that Alhaji Shehu Shagari did not even make a case for him as a show of gratitude for facilitating his emergence in 1979, the source of his love/hate relation with the Yoruba in the past.
The question, which the leaders of the Arewa should ask themselves is if General Obasanjo had died as General Yar'Adua before the sudden death of General Abacha, what would the north have done after the sudden death of General Abacha in 1998? How come they suddenly discovered General Obasanjo and thought they found a southerner who forget the injustice done to him and to Chief Abiola because they were not from the north. How do they think that President Obasanjo would not have a mind of his own and would rule Nigeria in their image after the death of General Abacha? These former Heads of States are a shameless lot with no claim to democratic credentials and human rights and no national vision.
The former Heads of State should be ashamed to openly confess what they are claiming today. It is a matter of record that they through their acts of omission, commission and indiscretion connived at the plot to eliminate a key member of the clique of the former Heads of State, General Obasanjo before the sudden death of Abacha.
The former Heads of State should be ashamed to openly confess that they went for General Obasanjo because they erroneously believed that he was not and would not be supported by leaders of the Yorubas. Whether the Yoruba leaders supported him before the election or not, that should not make President Obasanjo a Fulani agent.
The former Heads of State should be ashamed not to appreciate that President Obasanjo belongs to the leadership, traditional and political any day of the Yoruba ethnic nationality. They ought to have known that Obasanjo as a leader in Yoruba land would not participate in anything that would bring shame to his ethnic nationality. One thought this would have been common sense, but it is not so common with the leaders of the Arewa of the former Heads of State.
Why are the Northern leaders now complaining? Have they looked back to the past forty years and observe how they misruled the country and abandoned their people in the field of education and health care delivery? Where were they when Chief Obafemi Awolowo commenced the free and compulsory education in the Western Region in 1955? While did they not embrace Chief Awolowo with his free education plank in 1979 and later in 1983, if they genuinely want to extend education to the masses? What did the northern rulers do with the money provided them in the past for education from oil money? The crisis of development in the north is traceable to the bankrupt policies of the former Heads of State who are from the north.
What Nigerians should note is that the northern political leaders are shamelessly blundering for the third time. They blundered with the way they treated Chief MKO Abiola who was a very close associate with the northern religious and traditional leadership. They were shortsighted and humiliated him unto death in 1998.
They blundered with the way they went for General Obasanjo after the death of General Abacha and are now treating him with contempt. President Obasanjo had in the past protected them as they schemed to succeed the military in 1979.
During these two occasions the key player was General Babangida. Why are the northern political leaders so pliable? Why are they so dependent on the former military President, General Ibrahim Babangida for a third blunder in their search for a national leadership?
Why can't Banbangida decide to seek an elective office? He needs to do this instead of financing elections of Senators and Governors and President. General Babangida would be surprised to see how the northern voters would treat him, not to talk about the southern voters.
General Babangida should test his popularity at the poll; he should stop manipulating the northern leaders and Nigeria with his unlimited wealth. Any day he decides to use that unlimited wealth to seek an elective national political leadership in Nigeria, he would know the true nature of Nigerian political class, whether in the north or in the south. Maybe then I would announce my intention for the same office with no money but with my name.
ONE WAY OUT, MR. PRESIDENT
Mr. President you have one way out of the present dilemma in which you find yourself and you should act fast. You should distance yourself from the league of former Heads of State. They have no reputation and your deference to them for any reason would further complicate your search for solution to the problems of Nigeria.
That they did not attend the 40th Anniversary of the Nigerian independence should not be a cause for worry at all. Why did President Obasanjo have to invite them within the same week they denounced him publicly?
There is no reason to consider them in preference to such genuine nationalist as Chief Anthony Enahoro whose name surfaced on two occasions in the nation's history. This is what the president did not emphasize in his address to the nation on October 1, 2000. Our history books show that the first occasion when Chief Enahoro's name surfaced in the Nigerian history book was during the nationalist movement. The second was during the civil war. Do we have any northern leaders living or dead who can be compared with Chief Enahoro's credentials? For the education of the northern leaders, Chief Enahoro is the only surviving anti-colonialist leader of the 1953 fame. Chief Enahoro with the late Dr. Okoi Aripo was a key player in the war of national unity at the various international fora between 1967 and 1970. Can Alhaji Shagari of about the same age compare himself with Chief Enahoro on the two counts? Where was Alhaji Shagari in 1953 and what was he doing during the civil war?
Mr. President, I still stand by my argument that none of the former Heads of State should be members of the Council of State from their record and their antecedents. The founding fathers of the idea of a Council of State to serve as advisers to the elected President had in mind a former President with democratic credentials and not one with a history of denial of human dignity to Nigerians in the past. What kind of advice does the President expect to receive from them, when they are openly regional/religious/ethnic advocates?
A NATIONAL CONFERENCE: THE SAVING GRACE FOR PRESIDENT OBASANJO
The President should 'challenge' all groups: social, professional ethnic religious including those calling themselves Arewa Consultative Forum to come forward with their claims and counter-claims for a national discussion or a national dialogue or a national conference. The President should not be a victim of term such as whether we call it 'Sovereign National Conference' or what have you. The fears of the northern leaders are that they would not be able to control the outcome of such a conference. Why should they arrogate to themselves so much one does not understand.
For example one should question the genuineness of the Arewa Consultative Forum. A National Conference would be an opportunity for Alhaji Shehu Shagari to come forward to make a case for the north.
Nigerians would want to know why the north is against what makes election credible elsewhere such as the use of ID Cards. At the moment, their opposition to the use of national ID as basis of determining the true figures in subsequent elections has no basis. Nigerians want a voting population that does not include goats and cows as the leaders of the Yoruba adequately told us recently. This is a good advise and it is sad the former Heads of States are overreacting to the issue of ID cards. Have they heard the argument adequately made by the Minister of Internal Affairs and the Chairman of the independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)? Is this a crime to say so?
It is obvious that the catalogue of policies failures attributed to the President is diversionary. Why are they worried? Why can they not come out with the sources of their innate fears? At the root of their talk of 'marginalization' is their fear that the President might be forced to embark on the search for a new political order through the Sovereign National Conference. They talk of a dialogue and yet the are running away from a dialogue among representatives of ethnic nationalities of Nigeria. Whether they like it or not it is a matter of time. They should join other Nigerians to discuss the issues in the search for a new political order. The northern political leaders want the status quo ante where they would continue to reign. Mr. President, please do not lend your support to this new agenda of the Arewa leaders by omission.
A National Conference will allow other Nigerians to come forward with their claims and counter-claims. This is what the leaders of the various groups in the south such as the Afenifere (Yoruba), the Ohaneze (Ndi Igbo) and the Union of the Niger-Delta (southern minorities) want.
The oil producing areas would want to develop an argument why oil should be subject to the claim of the six states for local control against the claim of the federal government. Nigerians from all part of the country would be interested in the subject of 'ownership question' as it applies to natural resources and port facilities.
A National Conference would enable other political leaders come forward and dispute the claims of the leaders of the oil producing states in the face of the argument of the leaders of the oil producing areas such as Senator David Dafinone, Dr. Kimse Okoko, EK Clark, Mr. Solomon Asemota.
Nigerians should be looking forward to the plight of the Ndi Igbo since 1970. A National Conference would give the political leaders of the Ndi Igbo the opportunity to come forward to advance their areas of abandonment since the end of the civil war. Of course, the Yoruba would have an opportunity to make a case for a fundamental restructuring of the federal system. All these are too fundamental and cannot be resolved through the normal law making process or through the review of a Constitution, which Nigerians are learning to ignore because of the military origin.
The President should allow all the issues about the bogey term called 'marginalization' to be thrashed out in an open fashion in an atmosphere of give and take. The President should not adopt a policy of playing for time. Mr. President may I counsel that to ignore the resolution of these issues now would be a recipe for disaster in not too distant future. This is the President's saving grace.
AFTER PRESIDENT OBASANJO, WHAT AND WHO?
What one reads from the claims and counter-claims from different groups in Nigeria is the kind of question posed to Indians during the era of the 'tall' leaders that after Nehru, what? Nigerians are worried as what would happen to Nigeria after President Obasanjo.
The provocative statement by Alhaji Kaita and the recent Communique of the Arewa Consultative Forum tantamount to the threat of the use of force to snatch power before or in 2003. This is my interpretation of the various papers from the northern leaders. What one should tell them is that any use of force to shift power to the north now or in the immediate future would be the end of Nigeria, as we know it today. I hope this is not their plan. But if it is, there could and should be a better way of dealing with the issue. It is still through a Conference. But this is something they do not want to contemplate. It will come whether they like it or not.
What does President Obasanjo want to leave behind after his term of office? He is on the second year of his four-year term of office and we are still asking what looks like a stupid question.
The problem of Nigeria is not pursuing debt relief; it is not chasing looted money by Abacha. These issues important as they are, are becoming diversionary. They should henceforth be done quietly.
The President should spend all the international goodwill after the death of Abacha in making Nigeria a laughing stock. The President should stay at home and address the Nigerian problem of nationhood. The Nigerian problem is no more an image problem. Is it not sad that Nigeria after forty years of independence, Nigerians unfortunately are still discussing the nature of the union called Nigeria such as the following:
(a) how the various ethnic nationalities can live together;
(b) how to govern themselves;
(c) how local communities can control their resources; and
(d) how to choose a President.
The foregoing are the fundamental issues, which President Obasanjo should sit down and lead his countrymen and women to resolve. President Obasanjo, do not think you can resolve them as public policy issue or as constitutional matter from Abuja but please allow Nigerians to resolve these issues; this will be your legacy.
The President's legacy should be the development of an institutionalized form of succession. Under the system of a four-year term of office the third year is the most critical one as the year for the determination of successor. This in effect means that President Obasanjo is in his last productive year. Of course, from all accounts it is going to be a less fruitful year than the first year. President Obasanjo's party still has not resolved its crisis; other parties are in search a role; the legislative process is in shamble. How can politics of succession be anchored on the confusion? The succession crisis is at the root of the Arewa fears and they see President Obasanjo as the unknown. It is far from that at the moment. Nigerians in the north, south, east and west are faced with the frightening question: AFTER PRESIDENT OBASANJO, WHO AND WHAT? The international community will discover that the transition program military jacked by the retired military officers from the north and backed by the international community after the death General Abacha in 1998 has no basis as long as the issues in the annulment of the June 12.
NOTE:
I sent a paper in response to the public invitation to Nigerians in the US to come to Atlanta to dialogue with the president on various subjects. The subject, which interested me from the list of subjects, was "Sustaining Democracy in Nigeria". My paper will be released to the press soon because the points which I made in the paper, will be a fitting end to the three papers on the legitimacy crisis facing the President of Nigeria. The suggestions made in these papers are my last testament, while I concentrate on the writing of my books and awaiting the resolution of the lingering political problems.
Prof. Omo Omoruyi