HOW ATIKU ABUBAKAR MISSED THE POINT ON ORJI KALU
By Emmanuel Onwubiko
For two weeks running, leading national dailies have being inundated with stories of the narratives rendered by two leading Nigerian Political figures regarding the political undercurrents that signposted the ferocious and divisive political infighting between the immediate past President Olusegun Obasanjo and his vice president Atiku Abubakar just before the 2003 Presidential election. These two prominent politicians are Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Chief Orji Uzor Kalu the immediate past Governor of Abia State. The first salvo was fired by the irrepressible political juggernaut Orji Uzor Kalu who like most analytically minded and rational Nigerians were upset genuinely by the public show of shame displayed by the immediate past Vice President who sneaked into the Ota farm house now turned into a massive mansion in Abeokuta by Chief Olusegun Obasanjo thanks to his eight years of gross misrule as President of Nigeria. Faced by torrents and a barrage of criticism by a large segment of the Nigerian people who felt genuinely betrayed by that inexplicable visit by Atiku Abubakar to Olusegun Obasanjo- a man who engaged his then vice president in a free-for-all from 2003 to 2007 using all available state apparatus to frustrate Atiku Abubakar’s presidential ambition, Atiku Abubakar who was also attacked by right thinking members of his political platform under which he contested the 2007 election, came out with a very flimsy and puerile explanation that he paid a visit to his former boss and vicious political opponent- Olusegun Obasanjo to reconcile with him because according to Atiku Abubakar his visit shows that he is a man with a large and an immensely accommodating heart. But even his dye-in-the wool supporters and loyalists felt betrayed because he Atiku Abubakar did not confide in them that he wanted to pay a visit to his former boss. Chief Bisi Akande among several other influential bigwigs of his political family felt betrayed and he Atiku was lucky [may be because of his unprecedented cash value] to have escaped the hammers from his party which conveniently found a way of explaining that he was left off the hooks because of section 40 of the 1999 constitution of Nigeria which grants every citizen of Nigeria the freedom of association and assembly.
Former Governor Orji Uzor Kalu who is widely reputed to have spearheaded the anti-third term movement right from the earliest period immediately after the 2003 Presidential election and who indeed was wrongfully frustrated by the then maximum dictator Olusegun Obasanjo out of the Peoples Democratic Party that he reportedly helped to bank rolled and who out of the dint of political resilience and hard work coupled with what even his worst political adversaries identified as his immense charisma founded what has now become one of the few most widely respected and credible political opposition platforms- the Peoples Progressive Alliance [PPA] which in spite of the manipulative tendencies of the Peoples Democratic Party, the party in power and Government at the Federal level and therefore control both the Independent National Electoral Commission and the military including the Police, performed impressively at the 2007 election even as it won two of the most treasured states of the Peoples Democratic Party in the heartland of the over sixty million Igbo ethnic nationality. The Peoples Progressives Alliance even made a mark in far away Taraba State where it won a respectable State House of Assembly seat in a State that is totally controlled by the Peoples Democratic Party. It is not in doubt in the minds of right thinking members of the society that the immediate past president did everything in and out of the books and indeed in fragrant disrespect to the rule of law to rope in Orji Kalu and frame him up with alleged corruption charges because of the pro-Democratic tendencies of the then Governor Orji Kalu and his [Orji Kalu] strident and principled stand against the thickening plot by the then President Olusegun Obasanjo to succeed himself for the third time by attempting to bribe the National Assembly to change the tenure limitation clause in the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Undeterred by the plots constantly hatched by the then President using the then Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission Nuhu Ribadu to incriminate Chief Orji Kalu so as to make it legally impossible for him to aspire to lead Nigeria as the next President- an ambition that is legitimate because of the overwhelming facts that he is a clean Nigerian who has never being convicted for fraud or any criminal misdemeanour, Orji Kalu went ahead to run for the highest office in the land and scored good votes but for the manipulative tendencies of the ruling party. Just weeks after he left office and the immunity clause lapsed, the then Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission who had unsuccessfully tried to rope in Chief Orji Kalu’s mother into the phantom criminal allegations, now moved in to accomplish the whims and caprices of his pay master- Olusegun Obasanjo and arrested Chief Orji Kalu who had prior to that naked show of brute force by the then operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, had validly obtained a subsisting restraining injunction of a State High Court against the breach of his fundamental Human Rights by the Anti-Graft commission pending the determination of the substantive suit instituted by the former Governor of Abia State. Nuhu Ribadu brushed aside this subsisting court injunction and violently arrested Chief Orji Uzor Kalu and created a melodramatic scene at the Federal High Court Abuja division where his operatives arraigned Orji Uzor Kalu in the full glare of the media including this writer. Ribadu had earlier called Orji Kalu unprintable names in the media just like how he intermittently lashed out at the then Vice President Atiku Abubakar who indeed admitted in a widely read interview that he was instrumental to the appointment of Mr. Nuhu Ribadu. Nuhu Ribadu it was who authored an investigative report remotely influenced by Olusegun Obasanjo on the Petroleun Trust Fund scandal where he exonerated his boss Olusegun Obasanjo and indicted the man who introduced him to Olusegun Obasanjo-Atiku Abubakar, for alleged official indiscretion in the running of the Petroleum Trust Fund which statutorily falls under the watch of the Vice President not until after that fake investigative report on the Petroleum Trust Fund scandal.
Atiku Abubakar stated in a reaction to an earlier interview granted by Orji Uzor Kalu that the latter was lying when he claimed to have being at the forefront of those who confronted the then President shortly before the conduct of the party primaries prior to the 2003 election. Atiku said it was not true that Orji Kalu told the then President that he [Olusegun Obasanjo] was not electable. Atiku through his highly untrained Spokesman then veered off the track of his argument by introducing the comical dimension that it is only in Nigeria where people who are charged with alleged crime are allowed to play politics. Now here is where the Atiku Abubakar’s team committed a huge blunder. Reason: Section 36[1] and [5] of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to which the then vice President Atiku Abubakar swore to respect stated in very unambiguous terms to the understanding of even people who read Hausa language in school and are now masquerading as Journalists in the mainstream English media, that every citizen charged before the court of law, not court of Atiku Abubakar, is innocent in the eye of the law until proven otherwise. For the avoidance of doubt, let me cite what that section of the Constitution stated in black and white. Section 36[1] stated thus; ‘’ in the determination of his civil rights and obligations, including any question or determination by or against any Government or authority, a person SHALL be entitled to fair hearing within a reasonable time by a court or other tribunal established by law and constituted in such manner as to secure its independence and impartiality’’ . Section 36[5] stated that; ‘’ every person who is charged with a criminal offence SHALL be presumed innocent until he is proven guilty.’’ It is therefore preposterous that a man, who has gained immensely through the courageous and intelligent work of his lawyers by the several interventions of the Courts of competent jurisdiction to have escaped the destructive tendencies of the formidable traps erected for him [Atiku] by the immediate past President- Olusegun Obasanjo, could be associated with such a dirty language which characterised the press statement issued by his spokesman against Orji Uzor Kalu simply because he felt that Orji Kalu never allowed him to destroy the Peoples Progressives Alliance the same way he infiltrated the then Alliance for Democracy in his inordinate pursuit for political power. It is even more puerile that Atiku feels that he is better qualified to occupy the exalted position of the office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria better than Orji Uzor Kalu who is a bonafide citizen of Nigeria with all the rights and privileges to vote and be voted for in any electable position of his choice. What gives Atiku the impression that in a free and fair political contest in his home state of Adamawa that he could defeat Orji Uzor Kalu, a man who successfully defeated the ruling People’s Democratic Party in Abia State even as he [Atiku] faced the worst disgrace of his political career when he lost his home State and his party the Action Congress could not win any seat in the State House of Assembly? If not for a Bola Tinubu who could have reckoned with the Action Congress because most people I have met who voted for the Action Congress in the last election said they did that because of the influence of Bola Tinubu which he gained wrongly or rightly during the pro-Democracy advocacy era of the National Democratic Coalition which he funded from his hide out in the United States of America. What informed my current intervention was that faux pas committed by the spokesman of Atiku Abubakar who in his gross ignorance of the workings of the principle of the RULE OF LAW believed that once a man is charged before a law court that he stands guilty even before the final verdict. This way of reasoning is tantamount to trying to put logic on its head and for a Human Rights Activist I am obliged to intervene because I am very conversant with the workings of the constitution and because as one of those who indeed contributed without financial inducement in projecting the Human Rights of Atiku Abubakar when he was in political Siberia from 2003 to 2007 because of his alleged disloyalty in 2003 to his erstwhile boss who literarily rescued him from his local political terrain in Adamawa to national limelight. May be his visit to Olusegun Obasanjo is penitential and the photo shown to the World during that public show of shame called Atiku’s visit to Obasanjo portrays him [Atiku] as a once stubborn and recalcitrant school boy who suddenly realised the profound foolishness [pardon my use of language because I simply do not intend to draw an inference to Atiku as being foolish because I have the greatest respect for him as an elder] now returns to atone for his sins. Most people still feel that Atiku’s recent visit to his former political foe shows him to be a political chameleon that would do anything in and out of the books to win political power. Certainly Atiku would do himself a whole lot of good by distancing himself from unwarranted controversies except if he is working with the impression that any publicity is welcomed no matter the dimension or colour. Just like what Richard Hack wrote in his book titled CLASH OF THE TITANS that ‘’Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch are two storm fronts colliding. And like weather patterns, no amount of scientific analysis can accurately predict the outcome when these two astonishing individuals interact, cross paths, play God. For these are not ordinary men. They are manipulators of World opinion.’’ In the same way my intervention is purely on points of law and is definitely not meant to throw darts unlike the spokesman of Atiku Abubakar who did similar thing several times over during the regime of Olusegun Obasanjo who his boss Atiku Abubakar has now reconciled. If there is any room for principle and decency in Nigeria, that spokesman of Atiku ought to have thrown in the towel and look for something meaningful to do with his youthful life rather than hang around a man who used him to thoroughly and crudely engaged in a media warfare with a subject matter- Olusegun Obasanjo that he the boss has eventually reconciled with. Does he the Atiku’s spokesman not have shame and self respect? Or is he afraid that he is unemployable even with his brilliant University degree in Hausa Language which is in high demand in the labour market especially in the language classrooms of senior secondary schools even in the South?
+Emmanuel Onwubiko, a Human Rights Activist writes from Abuja.
