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Frustration and despair have secured permanent residential permit in Nigeria. The cost of living has gone haywire. Insecurity is at its peak. Poverty and hunger have turned many citizens into beggars. The ruling cabal had promised renewed hope. The majority of Nigerians suspected they were lying. They desired change. They voted for competence and capacity against primordial sentiments. Their desire is that their country should rise and reclaim its giant status in Africa and in the world.
Alas, the hopes and aspirations of these Nigerians were dashed. The master riggers snatched, grabbed and ran away with power. They dared their opponents to go to court. At the courts, the compromised judiciary gave a stamp of legitimacy to the electoral robbery. The snatchers now move with swagger after claiming questionable victory. The worst is that their eyes are now fixed on the 2027 general election. The plots are thickening.
The signs are staring us in the face. The recent appointments of President Bola Tinubu are a typical example. He has planted his loyalists in strategic places just like he did in Lagos. After ruling Lagos for eight years, he refused to let the state be, turning it into his private fiefdom and dictating the trend of events.
Now, they have begun to capture everywhere. The legislature has been captured. The judiciary is not left out. The executive belongs to them already. If in doubt, check out what transpired at the budget presentation of President Tinubu at the National Assembly. Rather than sing the National Anthem, the lawmakers started singing Tinubu’s campaign song: “On your mandate we stand.” This National Assembly comprises members from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Labour Party (LP), All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and so on. Do all these opposition lawmakers also stand on Tinubu’s mandate? Or have they cross-carpeted to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC)?
We are titling towards totalitarianism. And that is why some politicians are cross-carpeting. The senator representing Anambra South in the Senate, Ifeanyi Ubah, just moved to the APC. I am a member of his constituency. We elected him on the platform of the Young Progressives Party (YPP). But the senator felt joining the APC was the best thing that had happened to his constituency and to the Igbo race. I guess he is fighting for his political and economic survival. I pity him.
The other day, Tinubu appointed some INEC commissioners. Some of them are said to be card-carrying members of the APC. Despite the outcry over the appointments, and in spite of the fact that the action is against the 1999 Constitution, the President has not deemed it necessary to cancel them.
Obviously, they don’t want a repeat of what happened in the 2023 election. In the presidential poll, held on February 25, 2023, the APC suffered great defeat. Tinubu even lost in his Lagos base. But the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) manipulated the exercise to favour the ruling party. It claimed there was a technical glitch during the transmission of presidential election results. The so-called Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and the touted electronic transmission of election results became a farce. Just as Nigerians were waiting and wondering what would happen next, the electoral umpire sneaked an announcement of the result in the wee hours of March 1, 2023. In announcing the final result, the commission ignored widespread reports of violence, voter intimidation and falsification of results. The protagonists knew that once the announcement was made, nothing would happen to change the situation.
That was why people like Bayo Onanuga could have the effrontery to spew hate speech against a whole ethnic group. He said Igbo were existential threats to the Yoruba. “Let 2023 be the last time of Igbo interference in Lagos politics. Let there be no repeat in 2027,” he warned. For his bitter diatribe against the Igbo, Onanuga was rewarded with a juicy appointment as the Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy.
The cabal appears to be perfecting its strategies. Today, many Igbo landlords in Lagos are crying. The Federal Housing Authority (FHA) and the Lagos State Government suddenly realized that some buildings in Abule Ado, Lekki, Ikota, Ajao Estate, Festac and some other parts of Lagos were built without approvals on water drainage channels. Hence, they embarked on a demolition spree. Over 600 houses have come down. About 700 others on 6th Avenue in Festac town are said to have been partially demolished. True, the victims are not only Igbo. But who does not know that Ndigbo have greater stake when it comes to owning property in Lagos and elsewhere in Nigeria? I don’t support lawlessness. But one wonders why the relevant authorities allowed the developers to build without stopping them at the initial stage. Some of those buildings have stayed for decades. Suddenly, people were thrown out of their houses without any feelings. In these hard times! Could this be a vendetta mission? The answer is blowing in the wind.
In any case, the world we live in is vanity. You can be emperor today and food for termites tomorrow. Where is Emperor Jean-Bédel Bokassa of the Central African Republic? Where is Field Marshal Idi Amin Dada of Uganda? Where is Adolf Hitler of Germany? Where is Col. Muammar Gaddafi of Libya? Where is Master Sergeant Samuel Kanyon Doe of Liberia? Where is General Sani Abacha of Nigeria? The list is endless.
One major problem of most rulers is that they never learn from history. That is why history keeps repeating itself. We had a cantankerous First Republic. Politicians undermined the political process, leading to some crises like ‘Operation Wetie’ in the South-West. The military struck to put things right but ended up worsening the precarious situation. Soldiers stayed in power until 1979 when they handed over to the civilian government of Alhaji Shehu Shagari. The ruling National Party of Nigeria (NPN) went for total capture of Nigeria. Chieftains of the party committed all manner of electoral heist against Nigeria. Corruption became the order of the day. Again, the military struck in 1983 ostensibly to put things right. But they had their own challenges and problems. Luckily, they handed over to another civilian government in 1999. Since then, we have wobbled on with our tainted democracy.
Some other smaller countries have been showing us the light. Look at Liberia. On October 10, 2023, that West African country held a free, fair and credible presidential poll. Twenty candidates contested for the election. The first ballot failed to produce a clear winner. The candidate of the ruling Coalition for Democratic Change (CDC), President George Weah, and former Vice-President Joseph Boakai who was the candidate of the Unity Party, went for a run-off on November 14. Boakai emerged victorious. Weah quickly congratulated his opponent even before the final result was announced on November 20. He has earned accolades for this. As Weah, the former international football star, put it, “The CDC has lost the election, but Liberia has won. This is a time for graciousness in defeat, a time to place our country above party, and patriotism above personal interest.”
This is how it should be. The people of Liberia cast their votes and their votes counted. Former President Goodluck Jonathan did what Weah did in 2015. He lost the presidential election to Muhammadu Buhari. Even before INEC could finish announcing the results, Jonathan threw in the towel and congratulated Buhari. A good number of his party men felt betrayed. They labelled Jonathan lily-livered. Some said he was a fool. But it was democracy that won in Nigeria then.
Today, the scenario has completely changed. We are now in the era of snatch, grab and run with power. People will cast their votes but the judiciary will select the winner. It is injustice. It is reprehensible. And it is unjustifiable!
The erstwhile chairman of INEC, Professor Attahiru Jega, has made some germane suggestions on the way forward. Speaking recently in Abuja at the citizens’ town hall meeting on electoral reforms, Jega recommended an immediate review of the appointment of INEC chairman and national commissioners. He said it was unfair and unjust to vest power to nominate the INEC chairman and national commissioners only on the President. He advocated a transparent process for such appointment and called for the unbundling of INEC because the commission has a lot on its plate to deal with. He also called on the National Assembly to ban cross-carpeting by politicians, saying it had destroyed our democratic ethos.
Jega is right. INEC should be reformed. Right now, many Nigerians have lost confidence in the commission as presently constituted. They have lost confidence in the judiciary. They have also lost confidence in almost all the major institutions in Nigeria. The National Assembly should embark on comprehensive reforms of our political and electoral systems. Let’s have a new Constitution that will define the way we want to live our lives. Let’s make electronic voting mandatory in Nigeria.
That is the only guarantee that people will come out to vote in 2027. If these reforms are not carried out before the 2027 general election, people like us will not go near the polling booths on election day. They can continue with their snatching and grabbing of power. Good luck to them. But it shall end one day. That is my only renewed hope.
