The polity was charged earlier than the scheduled date of February 25th by the serious, masquerades and the usual sycophants to politicians jostling for elective positions in the presidential and national assembly elections.
Deceitful games and unrefined lies for ridicule, occupied the centre stage of the campaigns including use of thugs, marabouts and juju priests by desperate power mongers and their hangers-on.
In Bauchi State for instance and Kano where I covered the campaigns in line of duty, dangerous weapons were freely used and brandished by opponents of Governor Bala Muhammed and in Kano by those against APC candidates while in Plateau State, the usual and only available weapon for use was their usual religious sentiment against a Muslim/Muslim presidential ticket of the state’s ruling party APC that was neutralized by superior votes from other climes. All those efforts were in desperation to access power on the altar of violence and religious sentiment.
Those on the project of tenure renewal the likes of Governor Bala Muhammed relied more on the strength of their stewardship and credibility of their party’s presidential candidate while the corrupt and those on the ethno-religious sentimental pages enmeshed in credibility crisis were left to resort to the use of slush funds and dirty politics for their mischievous plans that woefully failed.
Suffice it to when former president Obasanjo completed his two terms in 2007 there was no controversy as which of the regions was to produce his successor on the platform of their PDP.
Although, there were internal permutations but it all settled down for the late Umaru Musa Yar Adu’a of the Northwestern geo-political zone in deference to unwritten but commonsensical agreement to sustain national cohesion and unity.
If former president Goodluck Jonathan, from the South-south had enjoyed two terms, there couldn’t have been any controversy of where to pick his successor from.
President Muhammadu Buhari completed two terms on May 29, 2023, but with a controversy over which of the regions to produce his successor within their party, APC while the PDP, avoided zoning the presidential slot to any region. It opted for the most qualified candidate from any region as a strategy without possible rancor.
For avoiding zoning their presidential slot, it never translated to mean the PDP and APC denounced zoning as a soothing balm but only chose to save their parties from nose diving into unnecessary brinkmanship and political katakata.
Zoning, some shylock and senseless politicians had argued, is no longer useful as an adequate tool for winning elections. How they intended to sustain that argument and pushed it with force or logic was hard to fathom, especially in the face of the audacity of some criminal acts and the parochialism of the Buhari presidency, two issues that made the southern axis of the country chafe.
Some politicians from the northern axis surrounding the exited president seemed prepared to throw their hats into the ring if not for anything tangible, at least to spoil the game which they almost did but lost out shamefully.
Buhari with all honesty pretended not to know the game of those his aides including the now bewildered exited Senate President, Ahmed Ibrahim Lawan who is now rendered inconsequential in the chess game.
Buhari was ghoulishly silent at the beginning until he realized the danger ahead. The APC hurriedly, silently and mischievously zoned the presidency to the Southwest and other key positions and kept it a secret unknowingly to other contestants from the other geo-political zones. It was a sealed and delivered deal including that of the Senate President and House of Representatives Speakership.
However, no matter how hard the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC) tried, former President Buhari, couldn’t have been succeeded by any other contestant than the secretly endorsed Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the Southwest.
The three leading parties in the presidential contest, PDP, LP and APC baited each other on their intraparty zoning arrangements, which were expected to reflect how their minds worked on 2023 presidential zoning permutations. However, their fancy footwork ended in disarray as the reality of the existential troubles facing Nigeria manifested in bold relief.
The crisis which Nigeria’s political elite will continue to contend within the months ahead, assuming their incompetence, bigotry, and ethnic exceptionalism do not make it impossible for them to pull off a miracle even in 2027, is how to mitigate the overwhelming damage done to the body politic by the insularity of the Buhari and Tinubu presidencies.
A northerner may emerge the next president in 2027 going by recent key appointments and the muzzling of life out of other credible contestants for the Senate Presidency and House of Representatives Speakership position if the elections hold.
President Tinubu will be hobbled by the dangerous and explosive precedents set by President Buhari in the last eight years as he was alleged to have made the core Northern States seemed a super race from the perception of most Southerners and those Northern minorities always in confusion without specific direction.
Disentangling the country from the convoluted policies of tribe, religion and regionalism will risk the ingenuity and resilience of the president Tinubu to no end. How successful he will be will depend on his national and international networks, ability to forge compromises and consensuses, and intuition and charisma.
But already, the narrative has been distorted by many analysts who set naïve criteria for Tinubu presidency. They have pictured the most ideal candidate for the job, and somehow, also, pictured the simplistic arithmetic and mechanics by which he will get magically elected into office in 2027.
The reality is, however, much different. When the country teeters finally on the brink, the elite, now recklessly accustomed to pulling back in the nick of time and saving the day, may yet be able to pull the country’s chestnuts out of fire one more time. This time, it will not be the disingenuous doctrine of necessity; it will be just plain commonsensical avoidance of the inevitable cataclysm. Their shortsighted policies and incompetent and hypocritical members have overtime pushed the responsibility of pulling it back, even if they have to make the most galling concessions as well as abandon their schizoid ethnic fantasies.
Comrade Shehu Sani of the 8th Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria had warned Bola Ahmed Tinubu earlier to beware of the hypocrites of Northern region. In a tweet, he suggested to Tinubu to secure the services of a Hausa language translator because the richly idiomatic Hausa may be telling him something different in the language contrary to what he thinks they are telling him in English during visits or official functions.
The former senator further expounded the thesis when he said: “Well, the person of Asiwaju is the one I know in the field of struggle…..He should try to know the actual feeling on the ground as far as North is concerned because I know what MKO Abiola went through. Abiola served the North more than any other businessman from the western part of Nigeria. He printed the Holy Qur’an and distributed same to several Muslim communities. He donated homes to the homeless northerners and empowered people; he supported academics and religious leaders.
Abiola was one of those passionate about the unity of Nigeria because of the solidarity between the Southwest and the Northern part of Nigeria. But how did he end up? Some northern minorities from the contraption called Middle-belt led by Gen. Babangida conspired against him and sabotaged him and at the end of the day…..”
But if a typical northern politician is a conspirator as alleged through the monolithic North that ceased to exist a long time ago from actions of day dreamers of a contraption called middle-belt butchering its entity —the Southwest politician is probably even more treacherous, often blinded by ambition and loves to exhibit any loyalty to their leaders and mentors on the grounds that their proud history allows them to grovel before anyone, saint or sinner. If Tinubu decides to join the train of core northern politicians by regular visits to the North regardless of the dynamics of his party and the pussyfooting of the presidency, he will have to contend with the egregious machinations of his mentees who disdain his paternalism. Tinubu will not only need a Hausa translator as suggested ruefully, he will also need an enigmatic code breaker to determine who in the Southwest to be trusted, given the fact that the loudest, earliest and bitterest voices against his presidential ambition manifested from his region of origin.
It is in the nature of the Yoruba to loudly destroy their own contenders, unmindful that such a seemingly noble and innocuous exercise contrastingly promotes more unqualified and probably more vicious and irredentist, contenders from other regions. But they are hardly bothered by such contradictions.
The whole political atmosphere may be hazy and increasingly hazier by the day; but one thing is glaringly clear and un-debatable to even doubting minds: there will be no power shift to the other regions in 2027 other than the North. The cost of keeping power domiciled in the North will not be too expensive for anyone or group to bear, let alone for fragile Nigeria not to buckle under. And regardless of how the APC, LP and PDP bait each other with 2027 in view, and notwithstanding the huffing and puffing of certain Southwest ambitious politicians, they will come to the ineluctable conclusion that forbidding power shift is a price they cannot settle, and a tactics they cannot hope to dismantle and sustain.
So far, the APC has Bola Ahmed Tinubu from the Southwest as president. The PDP that kicked away zoning the presidential slot had Atiku Abubakar for the presidency. If the PDP had played its cards well with the support of all excluding Nyesom Wike and his co-travelers, Atiku Abubakar could have emerged the president through a fierce battle between the North and the Southwest which could have refreshed memories of June 12, 1993.
Lest I forget, even for the National and State Assemblies elections, there has always been power shift within the States, Federal Constituencies and the Senatorial Districts as is applicable with the gubernatorial slots. Those who have served over two terms in the State/National Assemblies are in most cases pushed away from further contests because of loss of credibility, direction, robust debates and sponsorship of bills and implementation of economic empowerment schemes etc.
In 2023, one had expected the constituents of Yobe South to have pushed away that their Ahmed Lawal of this world and the Olufemi Gbajabiamila of Lagos (Suru Lere I) who has now shifted post to the executive arm as a Chief of Staff in the presidency for overstaying their welcome in the national assembly.
Ahmed Lawal has no business returning to the National Assembly having outlived his usefulness to national politics but………… his constituents are said to have refused to disconnect him from further circulation within the polity for obvious reason.
But if the system is to grow, the likes of Ahmed Lawal should be shown the way out and kept at a distance from national politics because they have outlived their usefulness to the growth of the democracy in Nigeria.
Ahmed Lawal came to the National Assembly as a political toddler in 1999 and now grown to full adulthood within the same spot but still not contended. What has he forgotten over the years to offer for the good of Nigeria other than greed?
Some say he wants to be the President of Nigeria, is that not a tall dream from a greedy village boy that easily passes for a tale by the moonlight. The man is too unfit to even preside over a local government going by his past records in the national assembly!
Nigeria wants to have the sunny side of life, needs to have the most qualified, the intelligent, determined and focused national legislators, not quasi contractors and those with credibility crisis to be rubber stamps of the executive taking pride in periodic visits to the Villa and in group photos with Mr. President for political deceit and ego-boasting meaning nothing but a mere foolery of self while their people are suffering and smiling in the hinterlands in the hands of bandits, killer-herders, insurgents and abject poverty from the absence of good representation and leadership.
Finally, from general assessment, APC has already dug its grave for 2027 for executing a hitherto concealed hatchet plan against some of its most credible and adorned members the likes of AbdulAzeez Yari, Ahmed Idris Wase, Aliyu Muktar Betara etc. These are giants in their own class but silenced through party secret denial of right, intimidation, frustration and threat.
Of the lot in the contest for the national assembly leadership, only Yari and Wase had the temerity, courage and guts to reach the final of the game despite the planted party/presidency ‘landmines’ and other odds on their ways to deserved victories.
Notwithstanding, they emerged as the 2023 Heroes of Democracy who resisted advanced tyranny by their own party and strengthened the democracy for posterity. But time shall tell!
Muhammad is a commentator on national issues
