AFOLABI GAMBARI
After enduring 16 uninterrupted years of military rule from December 1983, it was natural that Nigerians heaved a sigh of relief as civilian democracy was enthroned in 1999. Notwithstanding that the man who emerged as president, Olusegun Obasanjo, was a retired military General who had interestingly handed power to a civilian government voluntarily some 20 years before, hope ruled the airwaves that the new dawn would, if anything, enable popular representation in governance.
Little did Nigerians realize that the nearly two decades of military rule would still take its toll. It soon came to light that Obasanjo was far from weaning himself of dictatorial tendencies of the military. Without recourse to the National Assembly, the former president moved in army tanks and personnel on two towns, Odi in Rivers State and Zaki Biam in Benue State, reducing both literally to rubbles over reports that some uniformed men had been killed by the people in both communities after some skirmishes with the civilians. Obasanjo spent eight years in power; but not once was he made to account for the loss of lives and property that resulted from the unlawful army invasion on Odi and Zaki Biam. Impunity, rather than adherence to the rule of law, characterized the eight-year reign of Obasanjo government from 1999 to 2007. Democracy that was supposed to take root, even if gradually, was being withered. With his experience, he ought to have revolutionized the power sector with the aim of boosting the country’s industrial base that would in turn boost employment opportunities. Instead, he systematically turned the power sector to a huge drain pipe. It is still being investigated how over $16billion was invested in the vital sector with virtually no returns in adequate power supply. It was the lowest point of Obasanjo’s second coming to governance and it has haunted him personally to this day.
The late Umaru Musa Yar’Adua who succeeded Obasanjo could well have done much better, especially as he sought to correct the ills he inherited. But ill health proved his undoing until he succumbed barely one year into his reign and remained in and out of the hospital till his death in May 2010. In came his deputy, Goodluck Jonathan, who assumed the reins before being elected in 2011 as substantive president. He tried to make some impact, especially up North where he initiated the “almajiri” education that aimed at encouraging the mass of school age kids to get off street begging that had taken in no less than three million of them. But the politics of “second term” soon consumed Jonathan as he seemed to lose control of Nigeria’s fiscal discipline that enabled cash flow that had not been witnessed in the country’s history. It was a mad rush by state officials to acquire cash wealth. In the end, it did not help Jonathan’s cause. He lost his re-election, creating history as the first incumbent president to lose his seat to an opponent at the first term.
Many had thought that past experience of having ruled Nigeria as a military General from 1983 to 1985 would help Jonathan’s successor, Muhammadu Buhari, to steady the country’s boat, as it were. But after three years in the saddle, Buhari has as much demonstrated inexperience as he has exposed his clueless disposition to vital national issues, particularly security of lives and property. Tens of hundreds of innocent Nigerians have lost their lives to Boko Haram insurgents in the far North while hundreds more have also suffered similar loss to cattle herders in what clearly appears as failure of government.
Whatever was left of hope on any turnaround has appeared shattered, no thanks to the gale of defections that has lately made members of the ruling party All Progressives Congress to defect to the former ruling party Peoples Democratic Party, ostensibly to weaken the ruling APC and return power to where it came from as the 2019 election looms. Where this would leave the progress of Nigeria, should power at the center return to its former custodian, had better be imagined. Yet, the onus lies squarely on the Nigerian majority: do they really know exactly what they want or what is good for them? Perhaps, they do. Perhaps, they do not.
Afolabi Gambari
Lagos, Nigeria
Tel: +2348064651922, +2348116706849
Journalist, Environmentalist, Social Commentator
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