The powerbrokers of Nigeria appear to have reached their wit’s end. They appear to be in a dilemma over what to do with the Igbo over the electoral change of guard that will take place next year. What do they do with and about the Igbo quest for the presidency? That is the big question they are battling with. At no time in the history of Nigeria, since the cessation of hostilities between Nigeria and Biafra in 1970, have the powerbrokers, who have been dispensing the spoils of war, found themselves in a tight corner over what to do with the Igbo.
For over 50 years, it has been convenient to consign the Igbo to a corner over power sharing. The musical chairs over the power game have witnessed cheers and jeers. But the Igbo have never been at the centre of the storm. Now, the game of revolving doors has gone full cycle. The powerbrokers have allocated power to one and all. But they are yet to factor the Igbo into the equation.
Before now, some fashionable arguments were advanced against the Igbo quest for the presidency. But now, those arguments have become jaded and untenable. What then will the powerbroker do to extricate himself from the charge of willful exclusion of the Igbo from Nigeria’s power equation? This is the dilemma the powerbroker faces at moment.
As he tries to find a way out of what looks like a blind alley, some willing recruits are massing up around the powerbroker. But they are not helping his case or cause. Rather, they are muddling up his situation with arguments that are sophistical, both in content and delivery. One such person is Yemi Osinbajo, the Vice President of Nigeria.
Just recently, Osinbajo undertook the uneasy task. He tried to rationalize the insidious scheme to deny the Igbo their quest for the presidency in the coming election year. While addressing a gathering of All Progressives Congress (APC) professionals at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, the other day, the Vice President tried to deride the idea of zoning. He chided those whom he said were laying claim to the presidency on the basis of sectional sentiments. He dismissed their claim as untenable and appealed to his audience, and, by extension, other Nigerians, to resist the idea or the claim.
Osinbajo was speaking from his comfort zone. He has been a tenant at the Aso Villa for close to seven years. He has been enamoured of its alluring trappings. Reality may appear blurred or blurring to him. It is possible that he no longer recognizes its true colour. That is why many of those who dwell in comfort zones are prone to forgetfulness and, sometimes, selective amnesia. Perhaps, the only line Osinbajo can see clearly now is that which tells him that his bid for the office of the President in 2023 is justifiable and realizable.
No doubt, Osinbajo’s dismissive reference to zoning was targeted at the claim of the South East of Nigeria to the presidency in 2023. The man does not like the idea. He feels that he is too close to power to be edged out of it just on the basis of zoning. But his discomfort is understandable. Power is an aphrodisiac. Once you drink from it or of it, you may never be the same again. Osinbajo has been bitten by this bug. Were it not so, he would have made sense out of the clamour by the South East for the presidency. Every clear-headed Nigerian, except those that have been blinded by ambition, knows that the intricate web of power-sharing is one snare we must not allow to entrap us. It poses real and present danger and we can only overlook it at our own peril.
Perhaps someone needs to remind the Osinbajos of the South West that the quest of the South East for the presidency is supported by history and precedence. Osinbajo was here in 1999 when a deliberate and programmed effort was made to cede power to the South West. The likes of Alex Ekwueme and Ogbonnaya Onu of the South East were made to bury their ambitions because power had been reserved for the South West then. The scheme worked. I do not know of any one then who dismissed the arrangement as cheap and sectional. Nobody talked about sentiment. It was considered fit and proper.
In 2019, power was programmed to remain in the North. It was not opposed by any element from any part of the country. That was why President Muhammadu Buhari enjoyed an automatic return ticket from his party without a whimper. That was why the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) paraded only northern presidential aspirants. No southerner vied for the ticket of the party. Power was simply and wholly reserved for the North then. There was no talk about sectional sentiment from any quarters. The situation was considered normal.
But what is going on now? Those who planned and midwifed the 1999 and 2019 arrangements are intent on shifting the goalpost. They want to change the rules. They tell us now that zoning or power shift is nonsensical. They argue that it will not make it possible for the best to emerge. Some, like the PDP, are saying that the race should be thrown open to one and all. In 1999 and 2019, we operated a closed shop. It suited the fancies and preferences of the powerbrokers. Now they advocate an open race. Nobody deserves any preferential treatment. This is the conspiratorial plot that Osinbajo is queuing behind. He and his co-travellers pretend to have forgotten so soon because it suits them to do so.
Nobody needs to remind anybody that conspiracies of this sort have never fostered peace and progress in this country. If anything, they are the major reason the country is in a state of infinite regress. Those who are opposed to power balance or power sharing know this. They know the danger it poses to national unity. But they do not seem to care a hoot. So, how do you describe a person or group of persons who are not interested in the peace, progress and stability of their fatherland? You can call them nation-wreckers. They do not love their country. It will be sad if Osinbajo allows himself to be categorized among this distasteful assemblage of revisionists to whom the peace and progress of Nigeria do not matter.
The ongoing attempt to give zoning a bad name appears to be the last-ditch effort to discredit the Igbo quest for the presidency. But whatever this scheme being promoted by the Osinbajos of Nigeria may achieve or fail to achieve, Nigeria has the Igbo question to fully contend with this time around. Its outcome, whatever it may be, will have a telling effect on the effort of the powerbrokers to preserve Nigeria.