There are two sides of President Muhammadu Buhari that many Nigerians have not taken proper notice of. Each side is the opposite of the other. One side that’s easily noticeable is what you may call the ‘toughie side’. It’s the way he deals with the leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC), including the governors elected on the platform of the party. The President is in commanding control of the party apparatchiks. He is brilliant and deliberate the way he goes about it. His orders cannot be disobeyed. Two recent instances readily come to mind. First, was the way he reversed the purported sacking of the Gov. Mala Buni-led Caretaker Committee before the party’s national convention. The second was the ‘imposition’ of Senator Adamu as the party National Chairman. He left the governors whining and grunting.
Forget that Bola Ahmed Tinubu prides himself as the APC ‘National Leader’. It’s only a title without power and influence. President Buhari is the ultimate national leader and Commander-in-Chief. And you may ask: why can’t the party leadership disobey his orders? They simply don’t have the gut, the spark and the spine. The secret weapon: The President works on the vulnerabilities of the party leadership. And they know it. Now, here’s the other side of the President. This is not quite discernible to the general public, but it has emerged as his Achilles heels, very real and disturbing, and the country is paying the price. The question is: why has insecurity continued to worsen rather than abate in spite of the President’s repeated orders to the security chief to sit up?
Or are the Service Chiefs complicit in the worsening insecurity or in agreement with the latest report by the United States Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and the Harvard Kennedy School that “Nigeria is at point of no return”, having shown all signs of a failed nation? The CFR made this startling disclosure not long ago, saying it was the outcome of its research findings in Nigeria. Recall that last week, President Buhari was reported to have summoned a security meeting after the recommendations of the Council of State over the deteriorating security situation in many parts of the country. Also, after the National Executive Council (NEC) meeting of APC, the President warned that tougher security measures would be taken in restive parts of the country, including a review of operations and strategy. Since then, has the security situation been better or worse? Have the security chiefs heeded the President’s call or simply ignored him? If so, why?
From my own point of view, these are the likely reasons they are not heeding his orders. The service chiefs are capitalising on the President’s weaknesses. For instance, they know for a fact that the President seldom read books. If he does, he probably would have known that what a man says with his mouth is less relevant with what he says with his eyes. In other words, the security chiefs have learnt that the president is not a ‘talk-and-do’ man. They know he’s not a thinking man’s President. They also know he sought the presidency as a prize to be won, not a duty to be done.
Simply put, now that he has got the prize he so much craved for, nothing more to do. That answers the question: when things go wrong, why? In this critical moment that we have been living under the leadership of APC, wisdom is better than weapons of war. Listening to voices of reason is a priceless asset that a president needs and should take when given. But when a president sees criticisms as weapons of war, he loses the moral high ground to issue orders and expect those in the front lines to obey. It doesn’t matter how much weapons have been procured to fight the enemy. Failing to act forcefully is a weakness that the insurgents are cashing in on to unleash terror on the country. It’s not unkind to say that the security chiefs are overwhelmed, and possibly, Mr. President as well.
That’s why the literature on Presidents and their legacies is nearly unanimous in its advice: Begin early to identify areas you want to leave a worthy legacy, appoint exceptional talents with the requisite skills who will help you accomplish those tasks you want to be remembered for. These talents must be able at all times to give you unvarnished truth. They should not be ‘yesmen’ or sycophants. All of these attributes make sense because, a president’s authority comes from the public belief in his ability to govern, and his judgement to make right decisions for public good. It’s because the President is perceived to have failed to secure the country, and provide the right leadership at a time like this that many well-meaning Nigerians are asking him to sit up. For example, the Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Matthew Kukah, in his Easter homily, accused the government of ‘destroying everything in Nigeria except corruption’. Are our “individual hearts not broken today, or our homes, Churches and Mosques, education, power supply? Are the lives of our children and their future not broken under this administration? Bishop Mike Okonkwo spoke in the same vein few months ago, when he stated that “only someone who is blind or distressed will be satisfied with how things are going on in Nigeria”. This is the gritty truth, coming from voices of reason, not hate.
Regarding the latest order from the President, to the security chiefs, this will not be the last time the President will give such orders to the security chiefs and get nothing as result. On August 19, 2021 the President showed that same anxiety during an emergency meeting with Service Chiefs at the Presidential Villa, Abuja. The National Security Adviser to the President, Maj-Gen Babagana Monguno (retd), quoted the President as telling the service chiefs that he would not want to leave office as a failure. But don’t be deceived. As already said, it was not the first time that the President had issued such directive and nothing came out of it. So, why will this latest order be different? Should the President’s tough stance this time round be taken seriously by the service chiefs? The answer is simple: It’s the fear factor, the anxiety of failure. Insecurity and poor state of the economy, will determine whether Buhari will exit as a failure. Time is ticking away. Nigeria is on the brink. In democracies that flourish, some of the questions presidents often ask themselves are: Will I like to be remembered as a preserver of my nation’s peace and unity? Or as a wimp when courage and strength are needed to confront a common enemy? Or a president who presided over the division of his country?
A President is like a shepherd who knows what stirs the hearts of the people and make better choices. But not this President. Before the history of his presidency is finally written, it’s interesting, historians must record, that president Buhari rode into Aso Villa, the seat of power, like a knight on a white horse, looking ready, prepared and capable. There was warmth and excitement in the country when he came in 2015. There was optimism that after three failed attempts, and having succeeded in his fourth attempt, he would use the enormous power of the office for very large purposes.
That excitement seems far gone now. Why, because, too many of the people he brought with him were political amateurs, with a chip on their shoulders, some very arrogant, some divisive. Every administration do have it in some form though. The danger is when they become a stumbling block of some sort to achieving the president’s agenda for good governance. Where former president Goodluck Jonathan used a steak knife, Buhari is wielding a cleaver. Buhari will help himself and the country if he acts fast in all critical sectors. Insecurity is one key area he must defeat if he must not end up a colossal failure.