Adeleke and Tinubu versus Olukoyede

Nigeria under its current president, Alhaji Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has become a strange place. It could sooner than later become completely unrecognisable. About one year ago or so, a prominent Nigerian of the Yoruba stock alluded to the unfolding strangeness about this country. He rued what he saw. Today it appears that he has retreated to his cocoon in the face of a rapid deterioration in the country’s slide towards anomie. He foresaw the present ugly face of the country, and he spoke out publicly. Indeed he warned about where the country’s politics, economy, and governance were headed. He was particularly first alarmed in the weeks after the ‘’doctrine’’ of ‘’emi lo kan’’ was unabashedly proclaimed by the then ruling party’s presidential candidate, Tinubu.

A lot of water had passed under the bridge in the almost four intervening years since that jarring declaration which the Yoruba personage said was an indication that Tinubu intended to govern corruptly if he succeeded in attaining the presidency. That man, so far, appears to have been vindicated. Nigeria is becoming stranger and stranger. Corruption in this dispensation is an article of faith and a badge of honour. Being tainted or perceived to be tainted is now a pre-qualification for consideration for high office by the APC regime. Just look around you. The National Assembly [NASS] leadership [Senate and House]. The Supreme [Cult] Court and down the ladder of supposed courts of law. This arm of the government is a clear and present danger to the health of the Republic. Since 1999 judges have become the final electors [Electoral College in the case of the United States of America] for Nigeria’s political office holders, from local government councillors to chairmen to state lawmakers to governors and to presidents. The only time in the last 27 years that the judges had not ‘’elected’’ for us a president was in 2015. And we know why.

During the transition season of 2023, a new lexicon was introduced into our election dictionary by no less a body than the central election management body, the ‘’Independent’’ National Electoral Commission [INEC]. First, INEC declared that year’s presidential election results in the dead of the night in spite of assuring Nigerians and election observers which included former heads of state the previous day that the collation of the results would continue in the morning. One of the former heads of state was so alarmed and scandalised that he had to hurriedly leave Nigeria. INEC brazenly told Nigerians and those who purportedly lost in the presidential contest which result was announced with an inconclusive collation that they should ‘’Go to Court’’. By that conduct INEC had confirmed that deciding who becomes the president of the country was not in the hands of voters. It should be decided by unelected judges or justices who, by the way, were appointed by any sitting president who most likely would have an interest in the outcome of the election.

Now Nigeria has a president in Tinubu who takes no prisoners. To him everything is fair and acceptable in politics and the contest for power. He had said so himself. Except for those who failed to pay attention to Tinubu’s political trajectory, scorched earth tactic had been his brand of politics. Marchiavellian’s the end justifies the means. That explains why ahead of the 2023 presidential election, he charged his foot soldiers to ‘’snatch, grab and run’’ away with ballot papers, ballot boxes, votes and result sheets. They did. But his militia went beyond the exhortation by stopping voters who were suspected of not being inclined to vote for the APC from exercising their franchise. Many of the recalcitrant suspected opposition voters were left bloodied in voting precincts in parts of the country including especially in Lagos state where the phrase ‘’iya shukudi’’ became a byeword for election malfeasance and official cover up for evil.

In a twist of fate last week Tinubu returned to a similitude of ‘’Go to Court’’ notoriously popularised by INEC about four years ago. Curiously, the circumstance this time again has to do with election. A summary of the story will be proper. Osun state in the south west geopolitical zone is governed by an opposition political party, Accord. Tinubu comes from the same zone though some critics dispute his real nationality since the discovery that he once held the diplomatic passport of the Republic of Guinea. About 10 days ago the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC] arrested some ranking officials of the Osun state government including the secretary to the government. The anti-graft agency claimed it was investigating a suspected fraud. Nothing in terms of evidence publicly came out of the arrest and the quizzing of the suspects. They were released. Some Accord Party faithful were alleged to have been detained for longer period.

However, last week the EFCC wrote a letter to a bank which warehouses the account that receives Osun state’s statutory federal financial allocations, directing that bank to place a PND [post no debit] on the account. In simple terms, it means that no withdrawals from the account should be honoured. Osun state raised the alarm, saying that in addition to the alleged illegality of the EFCC action, its government would be crippled including in honouring obligations to contractors, suppliers and payment of salaries and wages to civil servants, among others. The public and the Nigerian Bar Association [NBA] were outraged. The body of lawyers said the EFCC action was blatantly illegal and politically motivated. The anti-graft agency’s action could not escape the charge of being politically tainted given that a crucial governorship election has been slated for August 15. So, the EFCC which is under the control of the presidency of a rival political party was rightly accused of working in overdrive to destabilise the Osun state government of Accord Party. The APC is desperate to win Osun which is alleged to be the home state of Tinubu, though he has been claiming to come from Lagos. In spite of its claims to the contrary, the EFCC was accused of attempting to cripple Osun state, destabilise the party led by an opposition party, and then confer an undue advantage to the APC.

State governor Ademola Adeleke said that he would approach a court of law for relief and to seek damages. It’s instructive that in the letter by the EFCC to the bank ordering a PND, there was no indication that the agency sought and obtained a court warrant for its action. Also in its follow up press statement that attempted to justify its patently suspicious move, the anti-corruption body referenced its enabling Act as the source of its power for what it did. Again, there was no evidence that the EFCC sought and obtained any warrant from a court of law to place a PND on the bank account of a subnational government.

Within 48 hours into the saga President Tinubu waded into the matter with his own variant of INEC’s ‘’Go to Court’’. However, this time he ordered his EFCC to go back to court to seek a revocation of the warrant it purportedly used to place a PND on the bank account of Osun state. He said he was ‘’embarrssed’’ by the action of the EFCC. It was a curious development. First, Tinubu claimed that he was not aware of an action instigated by its agency that could potentially lead to a breakdown of law and order several hours after it broke. Secondly, he said that the EFCC should return to court to vacate a warrant that even the EFCC had not acknoledged existed, not in the letter to the bank nor in its press statement justifying its action. Was the president misled by his advisers who have his ears? Was a cabal in the presidency involved in the attempt to cripple Osun state government ahead of a crucial election believing that the action would excite the president who is a professed apostle of ‘’snatch, grab and run’’ with election results? And when the bubble burst the cabal moved fast to tell the president that there was a court warrant for the PND? By personally signing the statement, was the president indicating or signalling a loss of confidence in his retinue of spokespersons and the bureaucracy in the presidency including the office of the chief of staff [CoS], and the office of the secretary to the government of the federation [SGF]? Or was the action designed to highlight how seriously he took the matter?

It was interesting that Tinubu wrote in the press statement which he personally signed about his avowal not to interfere with the activities of anti-graft agencies. But he just did that. [A social media cynic wrote that Tinubu did not interfer but merely intervened]. And so blatantly and publicly. To maintain the veneer of non-interference  the president could have used a third party including his kinsman attorney-general of the federation and minister of justice to reach out to the EFCC chairman, another kinsman, to reconsider his action. The message could have conveniently been passed in Yoruba language in a coded manner. Sadly, he didn’t. It wouldn’t have mattered, anyway, because many Nigerians would not be convinced that the president does not use the EFCC for nefarious ends. If Tinubu does that as widely suspected, he would not be alone in the abuse and misuse of anti-graft agencies. His predecessors including Olusegun Obasanjo [1999-2007], Goodluck Jonathan [2010-2015], and Muhammadu Buhari [2015-2023] did the same. To varying degrees their abuse of the EFCC, in particular, is well documented. If Umaru Yar’Adua did not abuse the EFCC as such it could be because of his nature and the fact that his term was short-lived.

It has been reported that Tinubu has followed up on his directive to the EFCC with a telephone call to Governor Adeleke. That should be seen as a good gesture. It would not matter that the telephone call could have been informed by the desire to stem perceived bleeding of support for Tinubu. If he is losing support from parts of the north that claimed they made him president in 2023, it would be unhelpful to antagonise some voters from his own geopolitical zone. He may have calculated that he would be better served by allowing Governor Adeleke of the Accord Party to win reelection in return for Adeleke to support his own reelection gambit. After all, Adeleke had earlier committed to working for Tinubu’s reelection, and the Accord Party’s presidential candidate has just withdrawn from the presidential election slated for January 16, 2027, and thrown his weight, [whatever that weight is worth] behind Tinubu. It could be a case of quid pro quo which is legitimate in politics. The EFCC’s PND, the furious reaction by Governor Adeleke, the spontaneous outrage from Nigerians across the political divide, and Tinubu’s face-saving intervention or interference will dog the lead up to Saturday’s election and echo into the future irrespective of the outcome of the election.