Beyond the June 12 celebration

On Wednesday, the Federal Government celebrated the first June 12 Democracy Day. The date has also become a public holiday to be observed every year. Before, our Democracy Day was marked on May 29 when the present political dispensation commenced. 

With the June 12 as the new Democracy Day, henceforth May 29 will only be the handing-over date and should no longer be observed as a public holiday. President Muhammadu Buhari used the occasion to rename the National Stadium Abuja after the late Chief MKO Abiola, the symbol of the June 12 struggle.

Renaming the stadium after Abiola cannot be faulted in view of the fact that he was the renowned ‘Pillar of Sports’ in Africa. I hope those who kicked when former President Goodluck Jonathan moved to rename the University of Lagos after Abiola will be happy with the president’s gesture.

One ambitious promise the president made at the event was lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty in ten years. This translates to creating 10 million jobs in a year. If Buhari can keep this promise, it then means that he will create not less than 40 million jobs in the next four years before leaving the stage. Buhari also promised that he would assemble a team of competent Nigerians that would assist his government implement its transformative plans in the next four years.

With his June 12 Democracy Day speech, Buhari has replied the critiques over his silence during his second inauguration on May 29. Nigerians will be happy with the Buhari administration if he can really lift 10 million Nigerians out of poverty every year in the next four years. If not, Nigerians will still see it as one of those promises that politicians make to make the people feel happy.

On his cabinet, he should quickly assemble the competent Nigerians that would enable him take Nigerians to the next level. He should not waste any time on it because there is so much to be done. Some of his first term promises are yet to be fulfilled. The time to start working is now. We have had enough jamborees after the elections and the inauguration as well as the June 12 rituals.

This is indeed the time for the administration to actually consolidate on its promises to Nigerians. This is never the time to start making new promises. Everything it wants to do must be accommodated within the four-year time frame of the administration. It is good that Buhari has finally kept to his promise of making June 12 the new Democracy Day and a public holiday.

Among our recent past presidents, he is the only one who thought it wise to honour June 12 and its icons. Whatever political mileage he reaps from it is deserved. Former President Goodluck Jonathan’s attempt to do so was vehemently rejected by the then opposition politicians. It is either that they probably did not want Jonathan to reap any political goodwill out of the June 12 struggle or that Jonathan did not make the right consultations before the announcement.

Regardless of the motive, the ghost of June 12 election has finally been laid to rest and it should be allowed to really rest in peace. And now is the right time to move the country forward democratically. The significance of June 12 in the nation’s political history cannot be wished away. The symbolism of the June 12 struggle will remain with us for a very long time to come.

But beyond the celebration of the day is the urgent need to ensure that the nation’s electoral system can be free and fair to enable again the emergence of an Abiola-like persona on the political scene. It will amount to a mockery of the spirit of June 12 when some Nigerians are excluded from attaining certain political heights simply because of their ethnic origin or religious background.

It will be ironical to celebrate the symbol of free and fair election and yet our electoral system is neither free nor fair in some circumstances. How do we celebrate June 12 when some Nigerians are denied the right to vote for a candidate of their choice? How do we celebrate June 12 in an atmosphere where election has become a do or die affair? How do we celebrate June 12 when some people are told to vote for a particular candidate or else face the dire consequences?

June 12 was a special day because it was the day Nigerians jettisoned religion and tribe and voted for a candidate they believed would liberate them from poverty. Nobody forced or coerced them to vote for Chief MKO Abiola. It was a pan-Nigeria movement and mandate.

That was why the annulment was massively resisted. That was why many Nigerians died in the June 12 struggle. Although some politicians sabotaged it, others kept faith with the struggle until Buhari’s intervention. We should be dancing on the grave of June 12 if ethnicity and religion are used to determine the President of Nigeria except in the spirit of power rotation between the North and South.

We should be mocking June 12 if a certain ethnic group is excluded from the presidency of the country. Celebrating June 12 amid banditry, kidnapping, herdsmen killings and political exclusion is injurious to the import of the event. The government and the political actors should expand the political space and allow more participants including men and women.

More political positions should be allotted to the women. They should be given more appointments in all the three tiers of government. The country is in dire need of politics of inclusion and not that of exclusion. Buhari’s new team should include more women than in his first term. The state governors should do the same and give political voice to the women.

The men cannot do politics alone without women. Our politics is so macho. It is in urgent need of feminine principles and moderation. The extant do or die approach to our politics is simply because it is devoid of the female principles. The nation is failing in so many areas and sectors because it failed to appropriate the female principles.

All developed societies and nations the world over have factored women in their development agenda. Nigeria should toe that line in the spirit of the June 12 celebration. Apart from June 12, the government should be bold enough to address other injustices affecting other ethnic groups in the country, especially the Igbo. Addressing all injustices remains the best way we can achieve national cohesion and economic development.