In what is becoming clearer as a political strategy, President Olusegun Obasanjo keeps supporters and loyalists guessing in this game of expectation concerning appointments into federal government boards. For how long will he keep them waiting?
President Olusegun Obasanjo has learnt and mastered the art of politics. So it seems. But this does not make him a good politician or a bad one either. He is just a politician doing his own things and controlling his environment. This is why his dilly-dallying over the constitution of the boards of parastatals and corporations has tasked the resilience of politicians who are seeking from him rewards for loyalty, those who are waiting to be invested with either chairmanship or membership of the various boards. They continue to wait, hoping against hope that the lid will be lifted and the announcement made. And, even though their patience is running out, there is little or nothing they can do other than to continue to be steadfast; for, to waiver could prove destructive to their political career now and in the immediate future.
The administration is approaching the end of its second year in office; and, time is of essence in the business of holding public offices. Elected public officers have specific time frames attached to their mandates. So, they run for and/or against time when in office, depending on the missions they want to accomplish. Obasanjo completed the crucial first batch of appointments when he constituted his cabinet. He appointed ministers from the horde of his loyalists and loyalists of top officials of the party and government who contributed to his victory at the polls.
But because the ministerial slots and other appointments by the federal government into federal agencies are too small to take care of the broad spectrum of party supporters and loyalists, due pressures are always brought to bear on officialdom for appointment into boards of parastatal corporations. This realm offers officialdom wider latitude to draw down or push through dividends of democracy to the grassroots people, particularly loyal party supporters/members. It is believed that appointing party supporters into a board is a way of empowering him or her. He or she is also expected to affect or empower the people around him at the grassroots level and make them feel the impact and pervasiveness of ‘their’ government.
This is why those angling for board appointments are anxious to know where their bread is buttered in the Obasanjo government; whether their investment in terms of funding, support and loyalty have gone down the drains or not, so that if they are not accommodated in this critical last batch of appointments, they could just gather themselves together and begin to chart a new political future and direction for themselves. Obasanjo knows how critical the board appointments are and that is why, it is believed, he is still holding the instrument close to his chest in a deliberate bid to continue to enjoy support and loyalty of party men and women who are looking up unto him to be made chairmen and members of these boards. Over three thousand party men and women are expected to benefit from the appointments when Obasanjo eventually announcee them.
A committee comprising some members of the party’s Board of Trustees had considered the list of boards as distributed between the President and the state governors with feelers pointing to the fact that almost all of the juicy boards, among them Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Petroleum Products and Marketing Company (PPMC), Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA), National Maritime Authority (NMA), Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company (NSPMC), National Electric Power Authority (NEPA), Nigeria Telecommunication Limited (NITEL) and a host of others fall within the jurisdiction of the President.
Reports said that the Vice President and other powerful forces whose loyalists have been penciled down for appointments have all submitted nominees to Obasanjo. Their lists of nominees for chairmanship of boards would have to go through a presidential screening. A source who claims to be familiar with the development said that Obasanjo gave them the opportunity to nominate five persons for chairmanship of the juicy boards, but he (Obasanjo) would fix the nominees into the boards he wishes for them to chair. This is seen as a limitation to the influence of the forces that nominated the persons who would have loved to be given further opportunity to personally fix their nominees into the board chairmanship slots that have been ceded to them so that the most preferred gets the juiciest from the basket of slots so given to them by the President.
A member of the committee that looked at the distribution chart dismissed the exercise as the President’s show because according to him "boards of University and tertiary institutions are largely what those who are not on presidential list would get in the long run". That maybe a genuine appreciation of the situation. But indications are that prospective beneficiaries are eager to see the crystallisation of the appointment process, however it goes. Is Obasanjo pleased watching the anxiety of these party men and women, just to massage his political ego or is it to advance a political agenda?
There were indications that Obasanjo may have decided to deploy the board appointments as a crucial political instrument to garner and deepen support for his administration and perhaps his on going, but tottering economic and emerging political reforms. It is believed that once the President announces the appointments, it would signal the end of the waiting game for patronage, at least on this grandiose scale, from the government. The sustained anxiety would have been brought to an end and more disaffection within the party would have been caused for the Obasanjo government. Perhaps, this is what is staying back the hands of the President from releasing the approved lists of appointments.
Perhaps still, the board appointments are being packaged to bolster support for a hidden political agenda. Some mischievous watchers of the political developments have suggested a proclivity towards a political future beyond 2007. Yet Obasanjo and his aides have denied such insinuations and speculations. The NCI, in a statement issued by its Secretary-General, Comrade Charles Chinedu Emenike said "it is now clearer to most discerning minds that, after this period of political messianic posturing of President Olusegun Obasanjo and his strategists, Nigeria’s democracy will run into a big hitch (and) this is because of subterranean moves by Obasanjo to succeed himself in 2007".
If indeed the President is attuned to the plan, then political wisdom dictates that he could deploy the board appointments to bolster it (plan). Could this be one of the reasons why the President has not announced the board appointments?
President Obasanjo should put an end to the growing anxiety in the ranks of party loyalists seeking board appointments. Playing yo-yo with their expectations is not good enough for party loyalists.
