There is hardly any Nigerian who is not in a state of despair right now.
\nSince Muhammadu Buhari was sworn in as president last year, despondency has
\nenveloped the nation. Disappointment makes the misery worse.<\/p>\n
In the build-up to the 2015 elections, Buhari was cast in the mould of
\nCharles Andr\u00e9 Joseph Marie de Gaulle (Charles de Gaulle), the legendary
\nFrench military general and statesman who founded the Fifth Republic in
\n1958 and was elected the 18th president of France, a position he held until
\nhis resignation in 1969.<\/p>\n
To some others, he was Nigeria\u2019s Mustafa Kemal Atat\u00fcrk, the Turkish army
\nofficer and revolutionary, who became the first president and founder of
\nmodern Turkey.<\/p>\n
So beholden was Atat\u00fcrk to his people that his surname, which means father
\nof the Turks, granted to him in 1934, was forbidden to any other person by
\nthe Turkish Parliament.<\/p>\n
Many of the promoters of the Buhari candidacy then assured us that by the
\ntime he was done with governance, he would be deified.
\nTo be fair, there are still some Nigerians who believe that Buhari is
\nNigeria\u2019s messiah but they are in a pathetic minority now.<\/p>\n
And that is a big tragedy, not only for us but for the man himself, who
\nfailed to rise to the occasion when it mattered most. The president has
\ndemystified himself.<\/p>\n
Yes, demystified himself because his injuries are self-inflicted.<\/p>\n
A friend raised a poser last week which I consider very pertinent. What do
\nyou do when you have a president who did not come to power through the
\nbarrel of a gun but the ballot box and yet does not care a hoot about
\npublic opinion, about national mood?<\/p>\n
What do you do when even the most sincere attempt to say, *\u2018hey, wait a
\nminute Mr. President, you are going the wrong direction,\u2019* is hoisted on
\nthe pole of deceit as evidence of corruption fighting back?<\/p>\n
The answer to this poser, I must confess, is not as easy as it seems;
\nwhich, perhaps, explains the melancholic atmosphere all around us.
\nBut it seems Buhari is beginning to take the people for granted. His
\ngrandstanding is becoming offensive. His *\u2018do as I say and not as I do\u2019*
\nattitude is beginning to rankle.<\/p>\n
So, when he reminds Nigerians of former military Head of State, Yakubu
\nGowon\u2019s refrain in the 1960s that keeping Nigeria as one indivisible entity
\nwas a task that must be done, as he did last week, even in the face of his
\nabsolute contempt for Section 171 (5) of the Constitution, which states
\nthat *\u201cIn exercising his powers of appointment \u2026 the President shall have
\nregard to the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national
\nunity,\u201d *Buhari does so believing that he has conquered Nigeria.<\/p>\n
He told those who paid him Sallah homage that the slogan in the 1960s, *\u201cGo
\non With One Nigeria (GOWON)\u201d* was very apt now, as keeping Nigeria one was
\na task that must be done.<\/p>\n
*\u201cOn security, we have made a lot of improvement \u2026 We are now concentrating
\non the (Niger Delta) militants to know how many of them in terms of
\ngroupings and leadership, and plead with them to try and give Nigeria a
\nchance.*
\n*\u201cI assure them that on the saying by General Gowon that to keep Nigeria
\none is a task that must be done. In those days, we never thought of oil,
\nall we were only concerned with was one Nigeria. So please pass this to the
\nmilitants that one Nigeria is not negotiable and they had better accept
\nthis.\u201d*<\/p>\n
But who said? Is it Buhari\u2019s prerogative to decide for the rest of
\nNigerians the negotiability or otherwise of their country\u2019s unity?
\nThe president is his own worst enemy. The tendencies he has brought to bear
\non his presidency are antithetical to unity. They are the very ingredients
\nthat spice up the dish of disunity.<\/p>\n
His politics of exclusion is so ill-advised that it beggars belief just as
\nhis inclination to nepotism and prejudice. *The biggest threat to Nigeria\u2019s
\nunity today is Buhari himself. His governance philosophy is so blinkered
\nthat it rankles.*<\/p>\n
Only justice, equity and fair play can keep Nigeria one and guarantee its
\nunity. The politics of inclusion rather than exclusion is the magic wand.<\/p>\n
Keeping Nigeria one is a task that can be accomplished but not by force of
\narms because if the Soviet Union could disintegrate, then there is no force
\nof arms that can keep an unwilling people together in an unjust and
\ninequitable union. It is only a question of time.<\/p>\n
Buhari\u2019s biggest problem is that he is frozen in time. Psychologically,
\nmentally and emotionally, he never went beyond the 1980s when N1 exchanged
\nfor $1. Someone needs to tell him the world, and indeed Nigeria, has
\nchanged and fundamentally too. The Nigeria of the 1960s is not the same
\nwith 21st Century.
\nPerhaps, he has not noticed that no ethnic group is afraid of the other any
\nlonger.<\/p>\n
Time was when the rest of the country caught cold whenever the fabled
\n*\u201cKaduna
\nMafia\u201d* sneezed. Time was when the fear of the Caliphate as embodied and
\npersonified in the Sultan was the beginning of wisdom in Nigeria.<\/p>\n
Not anymore!<\/p>\n
It is tragic to note that Buhari is unaware of how difficult it will be in
\ntoday\u2019s Nigeria to build the kind of coalition that included not only the
\nNorth and West but even the minority groups in the then Eastern region,
\nwhich isolated *Ndigbo* and made them easy pick.<\/p>\n
Today, the Ogoni are seething with rage. The injustice the Igbo fought
\nagainst, and for which they were visited with pogrom and genocide with
\ntheir active connivance, is being meted out to them.<\/p>\n
The Ijaw are wiser, so are the Christian minorities in the far North. The
\nfear of rampaging Fulani herdsmen has made Middle Belters and people from
\nSouthern Kaduna, whose sons actually did the yeoman job during the civil
\nwar, wiser.<\/p>\n
Buhari, the world has changed. When Gowon made that statement in the 1960s,
\nthere was Soviet Union. Today it is no more.<\/p>\n
Blacks, who the obnoxious Jim Crow laws kept away from the ballot box
\ndespite the 15th Amendment in 1870, which gave black people the right to
\nvote, until the Civil Rights Acts of the 1950s and 1964 ended them, today
\noccupy the White House, the seat of power of the United States.<\/p>\n
Buhari, the world has changed. Today, women, who were not even granted the
\nright to vote until August 18, 1920 (19th Amendment to the U.S.
\nConstitution) are poised to have one of their own occupy the White House.<\/p>\n
When Gowon made that statement Sudan was one country. The idea of an
\nindependent Scotland was an anathema. But today, the Scots are working
\nassiduously for a second referendum that would annul their union with
\nEngland sealed 309 years ago with the treaty of January 16, 1707.<\/p>\n
Buhari should be told that his blinkered policies, contempt for other
\nNigerians and politics of exclusion are the biggest threat to Nigeria\u2019s
\nunity.<\/p>\n
He should also be told that the joke is on him and his co-travellers on the
\nboulevard of insular government because it should have occurred to him that
\nthose who survived the scorched earth post-war economic policies of the
\nfederal government will survive him and his myopic policies in the 21st
\nCentury.<\/p>\n
The journey will, no doubt, be arduous but Nigerians will survive this
\nnightmare. At the very worst, this bad dream will last for eight years. One
\nyear is already out of the way.<\/p>\n
There will be collateral damages along the line, no doubt, but Nigerians
\nare survivors.<\/p>\n
Is keeping Nigeria one a task that must be done? The answer is ensconced in
\nthe womb of time. But even if it is, Buhari does not have the final say.<\/p>\n
**Ikechukwu Amaechi writes from Lagos (ikechukwuamaechi@yahoo.com
\n<ikechukwuamaechi@yahoo.com>)*<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There is hardly any Nigerian who is not in a state of despair right now. Since Muhammadu Buhari was sworn in as president last year, despondency has enveloped the nation.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50877,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles-opinions"],"yoast_head":"\n