The year 2007 in the political calculations of Nigerians has become a metaphorical pregnancy. You cannot hide it for long. It will ultimately show! Soon after 2003 elections, the skirmishes for 2007 began.
The warning by President Obasanjo that it was too early, too indecent and a distraction to begin a campaign for 2007 only put a lull in the posturing. Soon after, the subterranean movements assumed frenetic pace and even those who hitherto murmured their interest or spoke through ventriloquists began to shout their interest. The geo-political zones are in the trenches once more to claim the highly prized job. A political equivalent of a police action has become a full-fledged war!
Talking of police action here was not intended to be a pun, especially on ex-policeman, Tony Anenih, acting Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. But we remember that soon after 1999, when some interests started to position themselves for 2003, he declared that “there was no vacancy in Aso Rock!”.
Well, it turned out that, indeed, not only was the incumbent returned to Aso Rock, all the PDP governors, with the exception of Anambra governor, Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju, were returned, also after Anenih had so directed. We have been told once again by Chief Anenih that the Presidency, come 2007, will go to the North. And that has set the tone for the campaigns for 2007.
But two statements, one from the President and the other from Chief Anenih, have very significant impact on the succession in 2007.
The President has said that the party has not zoned the presidential slot for 2007 to any part of the country. And one may ask, in view of the Northern claim, if indeed there was ever any zoning the last time? We remember that Alhaji Abubakar Rimi and Chief Barnabas Gemade, all from two zones in the North, contested against Obasanjo (Sout-West) and Dr. Alex Ekwueme (South-East) in 2003. The North is making a case of oscillation of power between the North and the South. But one may ask, where is the South? It is the same North that has consistently argued that there is no political South, but West and East, as against one monolithic North! Now it suites the North to recognise a monolithic South to subvert power shift!
Secondly, Chief Anenih told the nation that it is only President Obasanjo who will decide who takes over from him. This statement once again warehouses the franchise and the sovereignty of the electorate both in the PDP and in the entire nation in the hands of one man! And you are bound to ask, where then is our democracy? When will it be the right of Nigerians to decide who governs them? Why would anybody go out to vote in 2007? It shows that the elections of 2007 will be working to an already known answer, an expo foretold!
But none of the above, really, is of great concern to me as the character and credentials of those warming up to occupy Aso Rock in 2007. And this is where the President’s veto as implied by Anenih, becomes significant. Let us face it; the mess Obasanjo inherited is a daunting one. Even when some of us criticise him, we are not unmindful of the enormity of the task before him.
We are only disappointed by the seeming double standards and evident hesitation to take on some of the leviathans standing between the nation and progress. And let me be gracious by discounting the Obasanjo veto and put the responsibility for electing a candidate in 2007 on the PDP, and that also assumes that it is only the PDP that will win the presidential election in 2007!
What manner of a person will succeed Obasanjo come 2007? As we answer this question, we must cast our minds back to where we are coming from and how we got where we are today.
We must be bold not to forget that the mess Obasanjo is wrestling with today is a product of a prolonged and unrepentant monopoly of power by the North (military and civilian). We must remember how the economy was used as patronage to subvert the souls of the human person at the expense of public good.
Are we so soon eager to return to the ugly dark days where people did no other work than brokering power and peddling influence, whether it was to obtain import licence or oil deals? Shall we, after eight years of sacrifices under Obasanjo’s economic reforms, be willing to hand power to anybody who will rationalise profligacy by telling us to our face that his or her own idea of economic management precludes having money in the bank and not spend it?
The years of the locusts saw the personalisation of power and the privatisation of state authority. Whoever was in power became more important than the state. His personal security either overrode or was equated to the security of the nation. As a result, our armed forces were deliberately crippled for 13 years to avoid being overthrown! The pursuit of self-preservation saw to it that our Air Force was grounded. Our Navy was effectively reduced to an armada of fishing boats. The army became what Lt. Gen. Salihu Ibrahim memorably called “an army of anything goes”. Our nation was left undefended while tyrants garrisoned themselves with goons armed to the teeth!
In the armed forces then, what ruled was rumour mongering, setting up of colleagues as coup plotters and lack of respect for hierarchy. Colonel Abubakar Dangiwa Umar is a good man, a patriot and a principled officer. But in all his stories about his escapades with Gen Babangida and Gen. Abacha, I did not fail to spot an evidence of total collapse of hierarchy and the flowering of personality cult. Which other Colonel, but one respected for his privileged birth, could upstage superior officers the way Umar did in his accounts? It was not Umar’s fault. That was what the army had been reduced to! Esprit de corps and professionalism were destroyed.
In the last five years, Obasanjo has been trying to rebuild the armed forces. Officers and men of the forces have begun to regain their confidence and pride. Professionalism has returned. Promotions are no longer based on as-man-know-man. Hitherto closed opportunities for overseas courses have been reopened. Equipment and spares are being procured to service our military hardware. Accommodation problems are being solved. It is not yet uhuru in the Armed Forces but definite steps are being taken. All the military votes may not have been released by a tight-fisted President Obasanjo, but at least, the votes are not ending in the pockets of “calculator Generals”.
As we debate and haggle about who takes over from Obasanjo in 2007, these are some of the thoughts that preoccupy my mind. The real issues should be more of the credentials and past performances of the individual or zone that is posturing to take over in 2007.
Who can run a modern economy? Who can use our resources to work for the Nigerian people? Who can restore discipline in the nation? Who can insist on due process and prudence? Who can hold power on behalf of the people, and not hold the people down to stay in power? Who can bring peace in the Niger-Delta and not resort to “judicial murder” as a solution? And who can sustain the modest gains of the Obasanjo regime? These, for me, are the issues on which 2007 should be fought, not on the greed of those who think they have stayed too long away from the gravy train or on the whimsical dreams of those who want to establish or equal dubious records!
