Opinion

Ethnic and Religious Hatred and the Deceitful Campaigns in Nigeria By Salihu Moh. Lukman

Published

2 years ago

January 25, 2021

NewTimes

Ethnic and Religious Hatred and the Deceitful Campaigns in Nigeria By Salihu Moh. Lukman

The American political scientist, John Mearsheimer, in the book, The Great Delusion – Liberal Dreams and International Realities, draws attention to how our capability for critical thinking and reasoning as humans distinguishes us from all other creatures and makes it possible to dominate our planet earth. It is also the same capacity for critical thinking and reasoning that enables us to create a body of ideas ‘about how the world works. Yet there are significant limits on our ability to reason, which have important consequences for social and political life. One such limitation, our inability to agree about what constitutes the good life, sometimes leads individually as well as social groups to hate and try to hurt others, which in turn causes the others to worry about their survival.’

As Nigerians, the problem of hate is making us lose our humanity so much that the notion of survival both for individuals and groups is more about our ability to defend and rationalise our inclinations even when lives of other citizens are in danger. Our instinct to rationalise unacceptable realities has worsened and is certainly extinguishing our humanity to the extent that there is hardly any difference between leaders and followers as well as educated and illiterate citizens. If anything, our education is making most of us to become leading campaigners and promoters of our disagreements and why we should hate each other on accounts of our ethnic and religious differences. But as Mearsheimer asked, ‘First, are our preferences rational, and do those goals promote our survival or make some other kind of sense? Second, are we acting strategically to achieve our goal?

READ ALSO: Cries for Justice: Sasha and the Burden of Political Leadership

Do we even have any goal and if we do, what is our goal? Is it possible in any way that our goal includes promoting crimes or rationalising it at all? It is very worrisome that as supporters in one or another of the ongoing campaigns to promote ethnic and religious hatreds, we are blinded and deafened by all the distaste for one another that has taken over national conversation. We are unable to see anything good associated with our so-called competing ethnic and religious groups. Everything is about casting aspersion on religious and ethnic groups outside the ones we belong. We profile one another in ways that suggest there is scarcely anything good about citizens belonging to other religious and ethnic groups. Everything anyone coming from other ethnic and religious groups other than the ones we belong pronounces or articulates must be interpreted to confirm our beliefs in how bad other ethnic and religious groups are.

It is so difficult to have any meaningful or objective national conversation on issues that touch on our ethnic and religious inclinations. It is almost as if no interrelationship exists across our different ethnic and religious groups. Yet, almost every day, there are very good reports of inter-ethnic and inter-religious marriages in the country. There are interesting accounts of many of our national leaders being married to spouses from different religions. There are also cases of celebrated children of serving leaders married to either leaders or children of leaders from other ethnic groups. The most recent is that of Rt. Honourable Dimeji Bankole, former Speaker of the House of Representatives who married Dr. Zainab Shinkafi-Bagudu, daughter of His Excellency, Abubakar Atiku Bagudu, Governor of Kebbi State and Chairman of Progressive Governors Forum.

Not long ago, in 2018, there was the high-profile wedding of Fatima Ganduje, daughter of His Excellency, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, Governor of Kano State to Idris Abolaji Ajimobi, son of the late Sen. Abiola Ajimobi, former Governor of Oyo State. These are important positive signpost of interrelationship across our major ethnic divides widespread in the country. Beyond the high-profile weddings that received banner headlines in our news media, there are many cross-cultural weddings of ordinary Nigerians taking place across the country, which never get reported. At a personal level, one is attracted to all these because being Hausa-Fulani married to a Yoruba, one can speak from personal experiences of what it means to successfully negotiate a marriage across our ethnic divide. It is a challenge that requires constant vigilance and engagement of family members to be able to protect and defend the marriage. Part of the reality is that children born in such successful marriages risk being torn apart and made to have identity conflicts because of some dynamic factors that push many of us married across our ethnic groups into some unhealthy hegemonic competitions. The only thing that can protect such children is the capacity of parents to make the needed sacrifices to ensure that the success of the marriage is beyond some notional privileges of exercising power within the family.

To the extent that many of us in inter-ethnic marriages are succeeding means that it is possible to set a national goal, which recognises and respects our differences, as well as encourages us to take all the steps required to ensure that good experiences of our co-existence define our realities and not the bad ones. The point is that there are good stories of positive co-existence in the midst of the loud hate noises in the country. Just as there are positive stories of co-existence, we also share all the bad instances of criminal conducts of bad elements from our ethnic groups, across all the divides. The current challenge around the criminal conducts of kidnappers and bandits who based on all the accounts, hide under the guise of Fulani herdsmen, affect every Nigerian irrespective of ethnic and religious grouping, including those of us who are Hausa-Fulanis.

Those who have farms are being affected by activities of these criminal elements too, notwithstanding our Hausa-Fulani lineages. Nevertheless, those of us whose farms are located in the Northern part of the country and not in the Southern part are also faced with the painful reality of these criminal elements. If anything, the report of activities of bandits in the North West and North Central confirm that the problem of taking over forests by bandits also affect the North in the same way, if not worse, which should make all of us to be equally interested in pushing our government to tackle the problem. The reality is that, if care is not taken farming activities have already been disrupted in the North on accounts of criminal conducts of these bandits and kidnappers. The level of disruption is such that hunger is about to set in as most law-abiding citizens can’t go to farms due to all the threats of kidnappings and their associated consequences, including possible loss of lives. Unfortunately, given all the hate campaign going on in the country, all public debates are reduced to expression of support for one ethnic group against another.

The point is, across our ethnic and religious divides, we share both the good and the bad. Part of the problem is that we want to have what we believe is good alone and we don’t want to cooperate with each other to solve the common problems. And whatever is bad is interpreted to be associated with other groups, which then lead us to believe that possible measures against groups outside us is what is required. There is therefore always the tendency to locate what is bad outside us and imagine that we can monopolise what we believe is good even as it is clear that whatever is bad can only find its way into our society with the support of local collaborators. There are alleged roles of traditional, religious and community leaders, including security personnel in the criminal acts of banditry and kidnapping in every part of the country. This is not in anyway being raised to defend or rationalise these criminal activities but to emphasise the need for unity in the country in order to resolve the problem.

One of the chapters in his recent book, Talking to Strangers, the Canadian journalist and author, Malcolm Gladwell, asked the question “What Happens When the Stranger is a Terrorist?” This seems to be at the heart of our current national debate in Nigeria, which was activated by the order of Ondo State government of January 18, 2021 that elicited the response of Mallam Garba Shehu of January 19, 2021. All these have produced chains of events in the country, including actions by one Sunday Igboho in Oyo State issuing ‘quit notice’ to Fulani groups to vacate parts of Oyo State. Although Oyo State government has condemned the pronouncement of Igboho, already there are reported attacks of Fulani settlements in Oyo State. Threat of arrest of Igboho allegedly announced by Mallam Garba Shehu is yet again generating more campaigns promoting ethnic hatred in the country.

The conclusion by Malcom Gladwell, about strangers being terrorists, which is exactly the problem manifesting itself in the forms of banditry and kidnapping in Nigeria need to be recognised by every Nigerian irrespective of our differences. ‘Whatever it is we are trying to find out about the strangers in our midst is not robust. The “truth” … is not some hard and shiny object that can be extracted if only we dig deep enough and look hard enough. The thing we want to learn about a stranger is fragile. If we tread carelessly, it will crumple under our feet. And from that follows a second cautionary note: we need to accept that the search to understand a stranger has real limits. We will never know the whole truth. We have to be satisfied with something short of that. The right way to talk to strangers is with caution and humility.’

It is almost predictable that our hatred for another will make us to dismiss the cautionary appeal of Malcolm Gladwell. More worrisome is that some of our leaders and public officials are completely possessed by what is clearly the anger in the land. Worse still, is that there is hardly any social or political enquiry taking place or if there is, everything is about rationalising and reproducing the current public anger and hatred for one another. It is very painful that as Nigerians, we are highly blinded and deafened by our anger against one another. Notwithstanding our anger, we want one of our tribesmen and women to rule the country in a democracy whereby such a person must win votes from every part of the country, including from groups we hate and also encourage them to reciprocate the hate.

Everything has become toxic, which as the American journalist and blogger, Ezra Klein in the book, Why We’re Polarized drew attention to how the toxic reality ‘compromises good individuals with ease. They do so not by demanding we betray our values but by enlisting our values such that we betray one another. What is rational and even moral for us to do individually becomes destructive when done collectively.’ If it is rational and moral to consider proposals to arrest and prevent criminal activities of bandits and kidnappers at state level, why is it impossible to consider a uniform proposal nationally, especially given that the problem affects all citizens from every part of the country? This could be as a result of what Ezra Klein identified as the logic of polarisation, which is ‘to appeal to a more polarised public, political institutions and political actors behave in more polarised ways. As political institutions and actors become more polarised, they further polarise the public. This sets off a feedback cycle: to appeal to yet more polarised public, institutions must polarise further; when faced with yet more polarised institutions, the public polarises further, and so on. …we exist in relationship with other political institutions, that they are changed by us and we are changed by them…We don’t just use politics for our own ends. Politics uses us for its own end.’

Therein lies the difficulty, how do we move our politics out of this polarised equilibrium? Both citizens and political leaders get trapped in the deceitful consciousness that the solution lies in our bias preferences, which encourage us to further polirise our society and our citizens. As our society and nation is more polarised, the problem of criminality gets bigger and overwhelming. Unfortunately, rather than pushing leaders of political institutions and actors to strengthen their relationship in the country in order to initiate uniform responses in tackling common challenges across the country, we seem to be more disposed to getting them more polarised. Regrettably, for our leaders to continue to enjoy our support, they must identify with our divisive choices. Otherwise, the electoral prospects of our leaders will remain in jeopardy. This is a reality, which has imposed the leadership of hatemongers.

READ ALSO: Narrow Politics And Questions Of Democratic Development

There has to be a way out of this mess. Our political leaders and our party need to assert their authority in mobilising alternative responses, which should inspire Nigerians to rise above the current high wave of ethnic and religious hatred in the country that is weakening our capacity to arrest and prevent criminal activities. No doubt every Nigerian must be worried about what is going on. Much more troubling is the fact that pronouncements of Mallam Garba Shehu on these issues tend to unfortunately accentuate our polarisation. While recognising that it is necessary for government to make some public responses to most of these developments, should it come from the office of the Senior Special Assistant to the President? Being a matter that may require clarifications bordering on both issues of interpretations of the law and policy of government, one would have thought it is better handled at ministerial level. Besides, given the nature of such issues, a strategic approach should have been to allow for instance the minister of information to continue to manage the responsibility of communicating positions of the Federal Government, since the issue is not just about position of the president. It also involves the need to engage state governments.

The way things are, it is difficult not to conclude that mandated agencies of government are unable to discharging their statutory responsibility as required because once the president spokesperson makes public statements, capacity to initiate any response may be obstructed. At this point, as APC members and as Nigerians, it is important to appeal for moderation in the way this issue is being managed. With the level of polarisation in the country, crazy responses from people such as Sunday Igboho and their likes in every part of the country are further worsening the situation. That can never be the goal of the government.

READ ALSO: Open Letter To APC Leaders – Politics Of Change: APC On The Brink

The other issue is also the need to strengthen our politics to be able to manage this kind of difficult realities. So long as we are going to remain as a country with all our diversities, there will always be this kind of difficult challenges requiring skillful and careful handling. This may require that our political parties are able to intervene when problems of our polarisation get activated to the level of manifesting as a threat to our peaceful co-existence as a nation. As a party, APC has a good experience when it comes to managing problems created by ethnic polirisation in the country. This is because in 2017 when the madness of Nnamdi Kanu’s IPOB and the so-called Arewa Youth got heightened so much that there was the senseless ultimatum to Igbos to vacate the North and a national debate on restructuring was producing all manner of proposals including maps of break-away parts of Nigeria, the APC National Working Committee under the leadership of Chief John Odigie-Oyegun initiated internal consultations leading to the appointment of the Mallam Nasir El-Rufai led APC Committee on True Federalism. Although yet to be implemented, the report of the Mallam Nasir Committee on True Federalism provides a standard template of how a party in government should handle difficult challenges of polarisation.

Certainly, if the party was able to move recommendations contained in the report of Mallam Nasir El-Rufai Committee to the level of implementation, the current levels of misplaced anger against the APC and the Federal Government in the country would have been moderated. Maybe the challenge we have today presents a golden opportunity for APC to be able to initiate processes of implementing the recommendations contained in the report of the APC Committee on True Federalism. What maybe required in the circumstances is for the APC Caretaker Committee led by His Excellency Mai Mala Buni to initiate internal processes of consultations both within the party and across the executive and legislative arms of government. Given that there already exists APC tripartite consultative committee, chaired by the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo with both the party Chairman, HE Mai Mala Buni, Senate President, HE Ahmed Lawan, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiala and PGF Chairman, HE Abubakar Atiku Bagudu, Secretary to Government of the Federation, Mr. Boss Gida Mustapha and Chief of Staff to President, Prof. Ibrahim Agboola Gambari serving as members, the initiative to commence processes of implementation can be started.

We need to appeal to our leaders and our party to rise to the occasion of this challenge facing our dear nation beyond the current public anger. Our leaders should be reminded about the words of Malcom Gladwell in the book, David and Goliath to the effect that ‘much of what we consider valuable in our world arises out of …lopsided conflicts, because the act of facing overwhelming odds produces greatness and beauty. And second, that we consistently get these kinds of conflicts wrong. We misread them. We misinterpret them. Giants are not what we think they are. The same qualities that appear to give them strength are often the source of great weakness. And the fact of being an underdog can change people in ways that we often fail to appreciate: it can open doors. And create opportunities and educate and enlighten and make possible what might otherwise have seem unthinkable. We need better guide to facing giants.’

While it is tempting to continue to interpret our current disagreements based on our deep momentary anger and hatred for one another, it may be the true catalyst for our attainment of greatness. That can only happen if our leaders are able to insulate themselves from being among the drivers of public anger and hate based on which they are able to painstakingly lead the country in a new direction of unity and national co-existence. May God guide our leaders to lead us in a new direction that can guarantee peaceful co-existence founded on love for one another across all our ethnic and religious divides. Amin!

This position does not represent the view of any APC Governor or the Progressive Governors Forum

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Opinion

The 2023 Elections And The Newness Of Nigeria

Published

7 hours ago

March 22, 2023

NewTimes

Dr. Hope Nwawolo

By Hope Nwawolo

Despite the hues and cries that greeted the results of the 2023 elections, what if the court’s pendulum stays or swings otherwise in the expected litigations?

What will it teach our inquisitive young children?

What will it do to the hopes and dreams of the youths?

What will it do to the mind set of those in diaspora, waiting and hoping to return?

How will it affect our heroes still alive and yearning for the good old times?

One basic fact is that no matter where the pendulum swings, something new has started in the political sphere of Nigeria. And because it was unexpected, it has become almost impossible to strangulate it.

In every competition, there is an expectation that the best man will win. That may not always be in politics, particularly, in Nigeria…where the winner may not be the best man or even the better man. And when it is said that politics is a game of numbers, sometimes, the actual numbers may not be visible to determine the end result. It becomes a case of the more you look the less you see; until interpreted by respected learned men with high integrity.

Politics, they say is a dirty game, where money speaks and promises made are broken without an iota of guilt. Where the gullible minds of the masses are deceived, with as little as a box of indomie. Where some vibrant but jobless youths are brainwashed to risk their lives to snatch ballot boxes for the politicians who do not know them beyond giving them stipends through some third parties. Where market women are forced to come out for rallies and campaigns because they cannot afford the fine that will be imposed on them if they failed to participate. They also do not want the harassment of the market leaders.

In politics, fear is palpable in the air, before, during and after elections. The 2023 elections recently carried out, depicted these more than expected in both the politicians and electorate. What started like the usual political pattern took a drastic turn about nine months to the first elections and though it was said to be only a social media affair, it got everyone sitting upright and tightening his seat belt, particularly after the first elections.

Now, there is a generational shift, a new awakening, a new dawn and a new political birth, waiting to happen. To wherever the pendulum turns; where the court stands, it will make a turnaround in Nigeria. It may be turbulent at the beginning, it may be emotionally draining and psychologically traumatizing, but it will point to light at the end of the tunnel.

There is a new hope backed by a high spirit of determination. An unexplainable faith in many people for that newness of existence and purpose. An unprecedented emotional and psychological strength in the youths not to give up on their dreams. An unquenchable desire to keep praying. Soon a newness will break forth to calm all nerves and dry all tears.

A newness that will permeate conflicts and hatred,

A newness that will dissipate unnecessary anger,

A newness that will usher in unquestionable and transparent political systems in future elections,

A newness of freedom to choose a candidate without coercion or molestation

A newness of jubilation after the announcement of election results.

This is the new Nigeria that is awaiting delivery…

Nwawolo, PhD, writes from Lagos.

hopenwawolo@yahoo.com

Opinion

Overcoming Policy Execution Trap As Nigeria’s Development Challenge

Published

1 day ago

March 21, 2023

NewTimes

Prof. Tunji Olaopa

By Tunji Olaopa

If I am asked to give a succinct and apt summary of the entire challenge faced by the Nigerian state in terms of her policy architecture and development management, in spite of contestation in the development literature, I will not hesitate in stating clearly and unambiguously that it is the challenge of policy implementation; the whole dynamics of getting things done. By elimination, the implication is that the challenge cannot be located as that of the dearth of development ideas, insights, models and paradigms. Right from her independence, Nigeria has been inundated with several ideas, both local and global, about development policy and frameworks. And yet, policy outcomes keep getting bogged down in the murky waters of political shenanigans. This means that the new administration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu has its challenge mapped out, in red, for it.

There is no shying away from this postcolonial predicament that has limited and kept limiting Nigeria’s capacity to honour the terms of her social contract with Nigerians. Hence, the Tinubu government will soon be inundated with the impatient agitations of Nigerians for a quick and tangible fix that will address their sufferings. And they are justified since they have not been given any real deal for the past sixty-three years of sovereign independence. And the new administration is obligated because that is the reason for seeking office in the first place.

Prof. Olaopa’s new book on public policy and development challenges

How then can we begin to understand this policy execution challenge? It is simple: how can an administration in Nigeria transition from governance vision and policy intention to policy outcomes that elevate and transform the quality of life of its citizens? Failure to understand and give critical and political attention to this question lies at the heart of the governance failures of successive Nigerian administrations. The new Tinubu administration cannot afford such a glaring mistake. And so, a fundamental case must be made out of the question of how policy intentions get circumscribed in the dynamics of policy execution that occasions policy failures in past administrations.

Modern states all across the world are distinguished by the traditional four functions they discharge as part of their administrative responsibilities—security i.e. securing the sovereign territory against lawlessness, policy formulation and implementation, governance regulation and service delivery.The capacity to perform each and all of these functions very well within an integrated framework in the governance context is what delivers the dividends of democratic governance to the citizens, and it enhances the state’s competitive and human development rating in global reckoning. With these functions, we have the metrics to differentiate between high-performing states like China, India, the United States,Botswana, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirate, Germany, Rwanda and the Asian Tigers (Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea), and low- or even under-performing countries like Nigeria that is still cluelessly stuck within a dysfunctional vicious cycle within her arrested development.

From the perspective of governance, there must be something these states are getting right in the connection between leadership, politics, and policy articulation. For instance, there is a trajectory of relationship that links elite bargains to development bargains. In other words, development is a
function of elite nationalism and the extent to which the political class of a state can commit elite suicide and gamble on development on behalf of the people they are leading. In Nigeria, low
manifestation of elite nationalism has made it really difficult for the political class to set aside their personal and egoistic class interests in ways that enable them to clearly and ideologically discern and navigate the deadly developmental landmines strewn all over our governance landscape by the
neoliberal implication of ideological apparatuses and frameworks to which Nigeria is beholden. And here, the factor of development gamble of the Asian Tigers’ elites comes into bold relief. From within the ideological ambit of the developmental state, the leadership of the Asian Tigers were able to define a policy space that consciously and critically weighed the benefits and shortfalls of external influences, especially the type that came from the World Bank, IMF and the other cohorts of the neoliberal policy dynamics. Their developmental circumspection paid off!

Since we cannot argue that Nigeria has been stumped by the lack of vision documents, development plans and blueprints, or even policy expertise, the locus of the new administration’s focus must be directed at the possibility of mustering the political will to undermine the mystified Nigerian Factor, and face the global neoliberal consensus in order to begin the crafting of an enabling policy architecture to drive development. And to achieve this translates to creating the delicate balance between ‘doing the right things’ (a function of decision making quotient) and ‘doing it right’(project and change management effectiveness), and overcoming the various political, cultural, structural and systemic constraints that trapped past well-meaning policies and intentions of Nigerian leaders in the dynamics of implementation.

There is first the conspiracy of elitist interest that ensures there is a poor resource allocation that focuses on elite bargain than development calculations and taking care of the national interest. Other constraints follow: (a) the disconnect between policy design and implementation due to weak implementation planning, risk assessment and incompetent change management strategies; (b) unstable and poorly managed macroeconomic policies; (c) policy and project discontinuity; (d) public service low capability readiness; (e) political interference; and finally (f) deep-seated political and bureaucratic corruption. In essence, development has failed not because Nigeria lacks the blueprint or paradigms to make it happen, but due to the dynamics of the politics that the political elite plays with Nigeria’s development potential.

Let me outline what we can regard as the “politics of policy implementation” that Nigeria has played for many years, a politics the new administration must take into serious consideration if it
does not want to fall into the category of failed administration right before it commences. This politics throws Nigeria’s development and policy non-performance right into the frame of the 2005 World Bank review findings about policy and development projects in Africa. According to the finding, 29% of development projects ever get completed, 45% of on-going projects are rated as satisfactory, while 26% of such projects invariably get cancelled. Such a review can never backstop a solid development project of a developmental state.

The politics of policy implementation in
Nigeria is founded on the following assumptions and practices. One: there is that dangerous presumption, that the new administration must resist, that once policies and development plan are designed, they are automatically implemented by the public service. And such a presumption is against the background of a scant investment in implementation analysis and planning, as well as the failure to facilitate the capability review, determine public
administration system’s capability readiness, and strengthening of the MDAs as the powerhouse of government administrative functionality. The MDAs, that is, are not working according to any
specific theories or praxis of change that can guide the functional integration of blueprints or paradigms. This kind of policy inattention draws attention to the policy contradiction: launching a
national development plan and strategy that are not implementation- ready in terms of adequate capability review of the MDAs integral to ensuring implementation success. Two: this
presumption is compounded by the uncritical reliance of past governments on policy experts and consulting firms who are tasked with designing high-end policies that are then dumped on MDAs whose capability reviews and implementation readiness have been neglected in the first place. The
extroversion of the policy design is then compromised by poor functional integration. The truth is that most of these consulting firms lack the appropriate deep content and solution frameworks that are in tandem with the context of policy dysfunction they are supposed to work with. Three: governance policy or project are hardly subjected to feasibility test determined in terms of scope and expectation that are captured by their framework of time, cost and risk assessments before
they are pushed into implementation. This makes it very difficult to benchmark funding projections for these policies and projects against revenue estimations, as well as facilitating in-built flexibilities that enable the policies and projects to adjust to volatilities and contingencies.

All the issues raised above constitute binding constraint that will undermine any governance possibilities the new administration requires to make a success of democratic governance. Undermining the binding constraints demands returning to the fundamentals. The first and most significant is that the new administration needs to interrogate the framework of how government business is currently being conducted. Governance successes are necessarily a function of how government business engages the complexities of the policy design and execution processes within a results-oriented frame. And that entails undermining the structural gaps between policy objectives, development strategies and policy outcomes. This demands second, setting the public service on a performance curve with the institution of a performance management system. This means that the public service must, for example, unfailingly now deploy KPI-based metrics to replace the cumbersome annual performance evaluation report (APER). And at the backend, it becomes imperative to have a monitoring and evaluation system supported by databases that enable staff and program continuous assessment, human resource development rooted in iterativep performance gap identification, supervisors-staff dialogue and multisource feedback mechanismsf for overall national development policy tracking and reporting.

The governance mantra must be on getting the balance between doing the right things and doing it right. And this cannot be achieved through the wanton multiplication or even duplication of
governance plans, programs and blueprints. What is needed is sequencing the blueprints into a coherent and feasible implementation programme, with the right amount of political will behind it. This gives the success of democratic governance a 95% chance of succeeding. The new administration needs that fighting chance!

. Olaopa, a retired Federal Permanent Secretary, and Professor of Public Administration .
tolaopa2003@gmail.com

Opinion

Rigged Elections And The Moral Burden Of Illegitimacy

Published

2 days ago

March 20, 2023

NewTimes

Prof. Hope Eghagha

By Hope O’Rukevbe Eghagha

Adamu: A man who rigs his way to power carries a moral burden!

Orezime: A moral what?

Adamu: You heard me, didn’t you?

Orezime: I’m not sure I heard you right. Moral what you said?

Adamu: A moral burden, I said!

Orezime: Hahahahahahaha! You make me laugh! Are you from the moon?

Gani: Or Mars?

Emeka: In which country? In Nigeria? That principle does not apply in Nigeria! There is no moral burden on anybody in this country! The election which produced Bubu in 2015 was rigged. Where are the two million voters from Kano State who voted in 2015? Was an INEC official not burnt alive after that election? The one which brought Obj to power was also rigged by the forces which wanted him to ease the tension of the Abiola tragedy on the Yoruba people. Yet those men had the temerity to preach against corruption!

Orezime: The international community winked at the whole exercise.

Gani: Yes! That’s why those two could only preach; they couldn’t really act decisively. A moral burden? They spoke from both sides of their mouths on the issue of corruption. The late President Yar Adua confessed that the election which produced him was compromised. An honest man, he didn’t live long enough to right the wrong of the period!

Orezime: That’s why I laughed when Adamu talked about a moral burden arising from rigged elections.

Bankole: In the ideal world, any power that is stolen and acquired through a dubious means imposes a moral burden on the power holder. No matter what the person does, that power remains stained.

Orezime: What does that amount to in our country? Even the brigands who shot their way to power in the notorious days of military misadventure in Nigeria soon became legitimate.

Emeka: You are going too far in our history. See what happened in Lagos State in the governorship elections of March 18. Ethnic jingoists went about preaching hatred against Igbo people and warned them against coming out to exercise their constitutional rights. Security officials looked the other way when ballot boxes were snatched in broad daylight in places where the opposition was leading.

Gani: A serving state governor personally went about snatching ballot boxes and threatened to shoot whoever got in his way. The same governor declared somebody wanted without recourse to the Inspector General of Police! He worked against the party on which platform he won the seat to spite the party hierarchy!

Adamu: And to think that this is the President-elect’s state. He kept mute through the horrendous attacks on Igbo people in Lagos State just the way the incumbent president has looked the other way when herdsmen went on the loose!

Bankole: Rigged elections are so familiar yet notorious in our land. It was the main trigger to the crisis in the Western Region in the First Republic because the people reacted when they saw a rape of their rights and wishes! It soon snowballed into a conflagration that consumed the nation in the late 1960s. Already, the youths are talking about a protest in the ENDSARSNOW# manner. I hope it doesn’t result in disaster. We have lost too many lives already!

Orezime: What I fear is the rise of ethnic profiling in a supposedly democratic society. To be sure, Governor Sanwo-Olu and the party hierarchy did not single out any ethnic group for verbal attacks. They even courted them. Yet they didn’t caution their followers to stop the degeneration into ethnic hatred. It is a dangerous curve what is happening in Lagos. I don’t subscribe to the Lagos is no man’s land nonsense which some misguided fellows are spewing, but threatening anybody not to vote their candidate is a new low! Can a Sanwo-Olu victory be said to be legitimate if a significant percentage of the electorate is disenfranchised?

Emeka: Good question. They did not stop there. They rolled out the culturally dreaded Oro rituals on election night. Come on! Who is fooling who? The Oro festival was designed to drive fear into non-Yoruba in Lagos. In the 21st Century?

Gani: I am sure the reports from election observers will be damning.

Bankole: I don’t care about those biased observers.

Adamu: Where are we headed in this country?

Orezime: We are on the road to Kigali!

Bankole: May we not travel that route!

Orezime: It’s a good prayer. But what are we doing to avoid the descent into anarchy? Nothing. Those monkeys are simply interested in acquiring power.

Gani: The Obedient Movement seems to have lost steam once it was misbranded as an ethnic agenda to grab power at the national level. Peter Obi needs to tread carefully so he doesn’t become another June 12! Some people are egging him on to challenge INEC through protests.

Orezime: If he decides to lead a protest, it would be within his constitutional right to do so, especially as INEC is stalling on the issue of inspecting elections materials despite an order from the courts. Peaceful protests are guaranteed by the Constitution.

Adamu: No one can be sure whether a peaceful protest will remain peaceful after it starts. That’s the experience the ENDSARS people had.

Gani: It’s not enough to stop people from taking to the streets. Protests are fundamental to democracy.

Adamu: We do not want dead heroes! Mark my words.

Bankole: That’s ominous!

Emeka: It means nothing. Nigeria must change. We cannot go on like this forever! Things are just going down. No cash. No fuel. No power supply. No security. No nothing. Peter Obi gave a glimmer of hope. Now that has been dashed to the ground.

Adamu: Rigging will remain a moral burden each time our President-elect travels outside the country, each time he meets foreign observers, especially those ones who have a dossier on him. History will also judge him and assess how he came to power. This applies to all the states as well where some politicians have turned themselves into demigods and have compromised poor INEC officials with mouthwatering sums. This is not how to build a democracy. The votes must be counted and must count. Seventeen people have their lives during the governorship and House of Assembly elections. We are supposed to count ballot papers, not bodies. Sad!

Bankole: The moral burden of rigged elections is on all of us. Without our connivance there would be no rigging. We can only hope that this will end some day!

Emeka: Tough luck!