Justice or peace

“Even peace may be purchased at too high a price.” Benjamin Franklin

In an ideal world, no one will be forced to choose between peace and justice. Indeed, it has been said that justice and peace are two sides of the same coin. The idea of justice is inconceivable outside a social context, which comes into existence in the first place to create peace under which justice can thrive. Justice creates a key precondition for the existence of peace, but is also fundamentally a function of peace. Although we say that there cannot be peace without justice, in reality justice suffers from the inherent imperfection of peace. All through human history, peace has had to be built on the skeletons of injustice. The resolution of social conflicts have involved painful concessions to injustice. The peace built on skeletons of crimes and injuries is an imperfect peace. It could endure, leaving time and post-conflict circumstances to heal wounds and determine its quality and longevity. It could also collapse because it is not adequately rooted in a fair resolution of the conflict between the search for justice and the need for peace.

The government of President Buhari is being confronted by the perennial choice between peace of sorts, and justice of sorts. Thousands of people now routinely march in towns and cities in the South East and South South demanding for unconditional release of Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). Mr Kanu is being detained and tried by the federal government for operating an illegal radio station among other offences. His supporters who appear to be gaining in numbers, confidence and audacity insist he must be released unconditionally or they will make life impossible for the rest of the nation. The rest of the nation is uncomfortably watching a small fire that could eventually engulf it.

The question is, will justice be served by the unconditional release of a man publicly dedicated to subverting the sovereignty and integrity of the Nigeria state, breaking its laws, leading a chorus of hate speech widely aired by an illegal radiostation, publicly stating his plans to take up arms against Nigeria with the goal of seceding, and inciting thousands to march and provoke with potentially frightening reactions? How much peace will be secured by the unconditional release of a man whose project is to violate the very essence of peace through the threat and use of violence and who shows no willingness to renounce his project?

Truth is, those who demand for the unconditional release of Nnamdi Kanu are not bothered over the justice or injustice of his detention and trial. They believe they can force the government to open the gates for him through intimidation and violence. People who do not recognize the legitimacy of the Nigerian state do not debate justice or injustice of its law and order institutions.

There are other interests that are wading in, from different angles. Some of them believe that it is not in the interest of Kanu to be released, with or without conditions, and this is precisely why he should be released. They see a man who relocated from the comforts of Manchester, England and literally provoked his arrest and trial in Nigeria, because every day he remains in the custody of the government of Nigeria, his stature and martyrdom are boosted. Now Kanu is bigger than MASSOB (all factions put together); Ndigbo Ohaneze and all the political leaders of the East.

Well, almost. Some of the Igbo leaders believe they understand the problem, and elders are beginning to raise their voices in a conflict which threatens to make them irrelevant, and pitch government and Kanu and IPOB against each other in a direct conflict with frightening consequences. A meeting of the highest organ of Ndigbo last week called for the release of Kanu, although it also expressed strong sentiments around respecting the laws of the land and the need for national commitment in the complex search for justice and peace. You will not find reasons why leaders who bear scars from conflicts that challenged the nation in its history in the last half century would want a man like Kanu to be released. You will have to guess that they believe it will deflate his campaign, and restore some standing room for them in the fast-changing vortex of Igbo politics. Anything to the contrary will suggest that they see their political fortunes intimately linked with a nod in the direction of IPOB and the clamour for radical changes in resolving Igbo grievances. In which case, the waters are deeper than they look.

The problem for those who may be persuaded by the case for release of Kanu is that no one gives a guarantee that it will be infinitely better than detaining and trying him, and dealing with the consequances as any responsible government should do. He will walk out a hero, resume hostilities on a grander scale, and reinforce the image of a weak and vulnerable Nigerian state which can be taken apart by mobs.

There could be Nigerians out there who believe they can mediate this conundrum successfully. The will have to persuade a Nigerian leadership neck-deep in fighting a dangerous and stubborn insurgency to see the IPOB threat through different lenses. They will need to convince Kanu and his mob that they cannot win against a nation united against fighting another war; and show him many Nigerians from all parts of the nation who believe he has no monopoly over threats and violence. They will have to have genuine credibility and clout. They have to have a good grasp of the reality that if poverty and perceived injustices alone provided impetus for violent attempts to pull out of the nation, Nigeria would have ceased to exist a long time ago. They will have to have enough credibility to urge the rest of the nation not to raise their own emancipation movements, and that Nigeria is worth preserving. They will have to be the type of elders and leaders that can give assurances that we are safe, and that we can live in peace with imperfect justice. If they are out there, they need to step forward. Now.

January 15, 2016

There are no extraordinary men… just extraordinary circumstances that ordinary men are forced to deal with.

William Halsey.

 

The nation is about to be taken down painful and quarrelous memory lanes in the next few weeks. Eight out of every ten Nigerians who have only heard of Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Ahmadu Bello, Akintola, Maimalari, Nzeogwu, Ironsi and the 30 months civil war, will soon hear conflicting versions of villany and heroism, injuries and injustices, winners and losers and how the cumulative lessons of the last fifty years should be read. Those who will tell the tales will have their jobs complicated not just because there will be other voices disputing their versions, but because fifty years since the nation was violently launched on a radically different trajectory that has shaped its essentials, there are recent events and developments that suggest that we have not moved on at all. Some voices will remind us that history has many versions, and they will display massive distances between 1966 and 2016.

 

Fifty years after the murder of leaders from the North and West, an act that has had attributed to it, every ill in Nigeria since then by many Nigerians (and upheld by some as an act of supreme courage and patriotism even if informed by unforgivable naivety), the illigimate product of that treasonable act, the Biafra misadventure, is being exhumed. It is difficult in retrospect to remember that Nzegwu and his compatriots never envisaged killing Northern and Western leaders as a means of seceding from Nigeria by Igbo and other communities in the former Eastern Nigeria today. By all accounts, their motives were to purge a Nigerian nation they saw as exhibiting crippling limitations that were curable. Biafra was not what they wanted; and no matter what you think of them, they were not, certainly at the onset, irredentists. Two generations since 1966, a group of Igbo people want to opt out of the nation. Many other Nigerians say they will not stand in their way anymore.

 

Fifty years ago, a poorly-conceived and executed act of violence against the Nigerian state and people turned out to be more instrumental in changing the basic structure and future of the nation than any other event. Regional and ethnic factors which had always been major players in Nigerian politics were thrust even more prominently into the heart of a nation that was attempting to come to terms with inclusiveness as an indispenseable element of the democratic process. Northerners will be reminded of the unjust killing of their leaders and the reaction of military officers from the region who wrested power back spilling more blood; led the nation through major structural changes; won a civil war and engineered a unique and successful post-war reconciliation. Much of the narratives from the northern end will potray a people wronged and injured, but people nonetheless who stood firmly (and died in their thousands) in support of a united Nigeria. A few voices will be raised in lamentation over the failure of the ‘North’ to recapture its past glory and pace in addressing the needs of its people. Blame for this will be located at the tragic events of January 15, 1966.

 

Western leaders and elders will hold up victims and fallen heroes, and an inventory of sacrifices and losses the region made in the struggle to preserve Nigeria. There will be loud but familiar lamentations over the failure of the federal system to achieve its true essence, and this will be visited on a military that shaped a plural nation after its own image, and refusal of elites from other parts of Nigeria to adopt a progressive and fairer version of a federal system. Voices from the West in support of a Nigerian nation as presently structured will be mooted, and there will be a split in the ranks of leaders and elders over whether to celebrate or condemn the state and record of the Nigerian nation fifty years since 1966.

 

Elites from many communities in the south-south will recall the agony of being marginalized and victimized in circumstances they were marginal in influencing. Some elements from a region which has acquired a major clout since 1966 may recall playing second fiddle to the Igbo; northern political brinkmanship that gave some of them some of their own space before 1966; the deliberate efforts to liberate their territories from Biafra which resulted in prolongation of the life of the war and, the efforts made since then to give them some autonomy and greater political relevance by the military after the war.

 

By an uncanny coincidence, agitations for Biafra are being more loudly re-engineered almost 50 years after the tragic events of January 1966. The pattern of results in the elections of March this year suggest that most Igbo political elites have shut out the rest of Nigeria. This will be case until there is proof that the 150,000 votes which President Buhari garnered in all the five eastern states were genuinely expressions of the will of Igbo voters. If votes by the APC candidate are a poor yardstick by which to measure the degree to which Igbo elite feel the need to chart their own course in the political arena, the resurgence of agitations for Biafra by Igbo generations unborn in 1970 is threatening to exclude them entirely from Igbo or Nigerian politics. In any case, it is safe to say that these are not the easiest of times for Igbo leaders, political or otherwise. The impending cacophony that will meet the 50 years since the historic breach of the rights of Nigerians to live under a democratic system will make sitting on fences more hazardous. Perhaps millions of Igbo people scattered over every inch of Nigeria earning their living in peace may also raise their voices in the din over whether Nigeria has a place for them.

 

We will be reminded once again that arguments over justice and equity are as old as Nigeria, and violent attempts to redress perceived wrongs have always created additional wrongs. The nation has a long way to go in addressing any group’s basic grievances. It will, in fact, never entirely succeed in doing this. But it has deep roots in all our lives, even in areas that cry the loudest over marginalization. Few Nigerians will accept that entire sections can just walk away, or bomb and shoot their ways out of the nation because it is neither feasible nor acceptable. It is not feasible because our history and the way the we live has made very Nigerian, Igbo and Kanuri and Fulani. It is not acceptable because it is a solution that will create worse problems. This country that many young Nigerians treat with contempt has paid its dues to exist as one united nation, and will pay more if it becomes necessary. When we are done with arguing over January 15, 2016, it will be useful to re-visit the need to teach younger Nigerians their history. This will be the only guarantee that a few of them will not be tempted to destroy a legacy every generation of Nigerians have helped build, since 1914; and teach them that 1966 was just a major milestone in an inevitably difficult, but ultimately rewarding journey.

 

Adamu Adamu

        I am stepping into the very large shoes of my friend and brother, Malam Adamu Adamu in taking over this column. I join others in praying to Allah Subhanahu Wa Taala to guide him in his well – deserved elevated position of Minister of Education.

A choice place in history*

By

Dr. Hakeem Baba-Ahmed

 

President Olusegun Obasanjo recently played a game he is most adept at (grabbing and retaining attention) when he wanted the world to know he was leaving the People Democratic Party (PDP). He did it in characteristic dramatic, fashion in a manner that will either improve his bruised public standing one notch higher, or send his image of a man of permanently in search of honour plummeting some notches lower. Asking a local loyalist to publicly tear up his membership card of the PDP which gave him the feet to stand on when late Abacha had all but finished him, then dusted him up and bulldozed its way with military muscle in tow into a presidency which he was later to turn into a personal asset, Obasanjo announced to a bemused nation that he is no longer a politician, but a statesman.

Given Obasanjo’s fabled native and acquired intelligence, it is safe to assume that he knows the difference between a politician and a statesman. But even a man with a registered reputation for thinking the sun has to consult him before it rises, he must know that the rarest of human breed history has grudgingly labeled as statesmen did not give themselves the title. History itself does not provide a universal version of statesmanship: many who are referred to as statesmen have been rogues and scoundrels in the eyes of many, and not all have started or ended with a consistent acclaim of greatness. Many statesmen were politicians or leaders whose moments in history involved the deployment of personal courage, vision and a ruthlessness unmatched by most mere mortals. Some harvested massive social movements powered by anger or misery of millions. A few died with blood in their hands, but their historians recorded victories that demanded extensive sacrifices of the blood of the resistance again them. A popular distinction between a politician and a statesman is that the former thinks of the next election, while the latter thinks of the next generation. It will not do too much harm to the myth of statesmen to say that most of those who have had the labels stuck on them were actually more involved with overcoming immediate threats and challenges. Then history, much later, assesses their roles and decides their places. Politicians you would say thought of the next generation will include Ghandi, Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Mandela and Kennedy. Neither they nor us will endorse categorization which gives them the same values in history. There are a few others who stumbled upon a set of historical circumstances which they engineered to create major turning points in history. It is trite to wonder whether they will fight again over a nebulous status of statesmen.

All this merely suggests that statesmen are not people who give themselves the title. Similarly, although the label sugests a more honourable of the politician spicie, it is by no means the case that while most widely-acknowledge statesmen have distinguished and respected political careers, the label has often been appropriated by many politicians or their historians who apply a little whitewash on their career. This has rendered the label dubious in value, and the tendency of many politicians to force their own versions of history on their people and the world means that there are few genuine claimants to the label these days.

President Obasanjo belongs to the category of politicians who choose their own labels. His personal choice of a place in Nigerian history may vary vastly from those of many Nigerians, but he is not the type who waits to be told on what level of the pedestal he stands. Even arguments that he lowered or raised the bar by a public act that humiliates a party which provided him a lifeline to his current status will only feed a lifetime of controversy over what is an appropriate place in history for Obasanjo. Indeed, this is a time when Obasanjo is leading a long line of people and institutions whose places in Nigerian history will be substantially written by what they do, or fail to do, in the next few weeks. This stage of our nation’s history provides unlimited opportunities for powerful people to improve their investments in a positive endorsement by history, or deplete their store of achievements, such that history will frown at their brief but decisive periods on the stage. By no means exhaustive, these are some of the people and institutions who have historic opportunities to carve out places of honour in Nigerian history in the next few weeks. 

 

1.    President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan

President Jonathan has fought hard to convince mostly skeptical Nigerians that he would make a better President if he has another four years from May 29^th. His self-assessment and ambition have offended many people, while others believe he provides a better alternative to Buhari, even if he has not created an enviable record for his six years of leadership. If by some miracle President Jonathan wins a credible election, he will go down in history as the longest serving Nigerian president who governed in spite of the most widely-acclaimed weaknesses of any president and administration. If he loses, the nation will embark on a challenging journey under a generic term of change which will attack the structural roots of insecurity, poverty and economic decay, and start a massive rebuilding process that will deliver much in a future with basic security and sustained development. President Jonathan could draw a line on the fine sands of history (if the campaign claims and slogans his party and supporters are putting out can be trusted), as the most misunderstood president who did a lot in spite of terrorist bombs, spilled guts of thousands of innocent Nigerians and unceasing criticism that he is too weak for a Nigerian leader. He could walk away from it all and hope that history will be fair and just to him by awarding him at least a pass mark on effort and good intentions.

But President Jonathan’s place in history will dramatically be brighter if he superintends the conduct of credible elections in March and April, and leads the challenging demands of a transition to an administration that will be formed by the opposition. While history will record him as the first incumbent Nigerian President to be defeated, he will also be recorded as the first Nigerian President to hand over to an elected opposition. President Obasanjo in 1979 and General Abdussalami Abubakar in 1999 all yielded control of the state, but the circumstances under which they did this could not have been more different than one in which a democratically – elected government loses, and hands over to the winner. History will say of President Jonathan that he was the first politician to give Nigerians the confidence that they can actually change their leaders through largely peaceful and democratic means. President Jonathan will offend people who think he has no business handing over power because he lost an election, but he will restore faith of millions of Nigerians in a system that promises to respect their will, and the certainty that future leaders and administrations will treat mandates to govern with greater care and respect. He will be recorded by history as the leader under whose administration our nation sank into the lower ends of respectability by the global community, but whose final act will match the greatest tradition of African and global leadership. President Jonathan could secure for himself and his close supporters a pride of place in the nation’s future endeavours to build a strong, united and democratic nation out of its current frightening challenges. He and his close associates will worry over how Nigerians and the next administration judge them out of power, but they will have a strong groundswell of national and global goodwill that will provide them solid protection against impunity and abuse. They will be debating the benefits of postponing life out of power, against yielding to popular demands to submit to electoral defeat.

If the next elections hold, and they are credible, President Jonathan will practically re-write history. If he wins beyond dispute, no one will deny him a place in the sun and a large-then-life place in history. If he loses, and then allows a smooth transition, he will have an even greater place in our history. For that place in history, President Jonathan will have to rise above personal ambition; overcome fear of life outside power; whip the military into line to respect the constitution; rein-in his boisterous and dangerous supporters who believe they can intimidate the nation into submitting to blackmail and another four years with or without the ballot; and assure members of his intimate circle and government that life in a post-election, crisis-ridden nation that will make them all virtual prisoners perpetually looking to a future worse than the past is not a better option.

 

2.          General Muhammadu Buhari

Even General Buhari could not have envisaged that his fourth outing in search of a mandate will transform into an unprecedented national movement that dwarfs his ambition. He is very likely to become President of Nigeria on 29^th May and begin to confront the practical elements of his party’s nebulous message of ‘change’. His campaign so far appears to have held together a new political contraption which emerged principally to get rid of the PDP. This is no mean achievement. It appears to have touched a widespread and passionate desire among Nigerians of all faith and language for a leadership that will be as different from President Jonathan’s as possible. His persona is the core of a national momentum to restore basic security and remove fear from lives of Nigerians; stop the institutionalized pillage of national resources and begin to fix an economy that can provide jobs, rebuild basic infrastructure and lay foundations for sustained growth. His biggest initial challenge will be to manage the massive crisis of expectation from a people desperate for genuine improvement in the manner they are governed.

But first, he has to win the presidency. While majority of Nigerians are very likely to prefer him to President Jonathan, his journey to the Villa is by no means assured. There is a whole army (no pun intended) of hostile interests, many with genuine capacity for dangerous mischief who lie in wait to frustrate that journey, afraid of a future under President Buhari. Most will do whatever they can to prevent that presidency ever becoming real. Others can facilitate a subversion of popular will if it insists on a Buhari presidency, even if the nation will burn as a consequence. A combination of a President Jonathan and his core support reluctant to yield to the possibility of a Buhari presidency, defence and security leadership hostile to it, and a compromised INEC could produce either of two options: a state of emergency which postpones elections and the certainty of massive national crises; or a rigged election that will produce the same consequences.

It will be unfair to the democratic spirit and to President Jonathan to assume that he cannot defeat General Buhari in a credible election. The most frequently asked question by the General’s adversaries and friends of Nigeria is whether he will concede defeat if he loses in free and fair elections. As he stands on the margins of a historic victory which only a free and fair election can guarantee, General Buhari does not have the luxury of prevaricating on this issue. In equal measure, he will demand that the elections are allowed to genuinely reflect popular will; and commit to concede to President Jonathan if he loses, in the same manner he expects the President to concede to him if he wins.

For a man who had shown unparalleled faith in the democratic process, running for the fourth time and exhausting the entire electoral processes (including the highest levels of the judicial system) in pursuit of mandates, history is about to deliver another challenge to General Buhari that will test the strength of his commitment to the values of democracy. If a credible election pronounces him loser, he will be judged over his reaction, and the manner he influences post-election developments. If he wins, history will serve him a cocktail of challenges and opportunities that will test his leadership qualities, and his judgment over what directions to lead the nation. Buhari as President will need to strike a firm and realistic balance between a past with gaping holes in accountable leadership, and a future that demands a disciplined focus on essentials of national reconstruction and reconciliation. He will need to satisfy the need for assurances that he will not be vindictive, while upholding the highest standards of good governance, particularly the place of the rule of law. History will judge him on his management of popular demands for restitution and justice against corrupt public officials, while sustaining the vital goals of ensuring political stability and morale in basic institutions of state. He will be assessed on the degree to which he addresses the rebuilding of vital public institutions and services, or devotes time in bringing to book those who destroyed them.

General Buhari’s place in history will change dramatically in the next few weeks. If he loses in credible elections and conceded to Jonathan, he will be listed among the rarest breed of African politicians who submit to the will of the people. If he wins he will embody the triumph of faith in the democratic process. He will be the first Nigerian opposition candidate to defeat an incumbent president. He would have given Nigerians the confidence that they have powers to change their leaders. He will hold up the hope that Nigerians can rally around values which defy ethnicity, faith or class. He will embody the deep yearning for solutions to the nation’s vulnerability to terror, impunity and corruption. His victory will raise hope that Nigeria can be fixed; human life will mean something; public institutions will work; the young can look to a future with confidence and have faith in their nation; and politics will regain its place as a means of freely choosing a better option from others. His personal style and disposition towards the values of democratic governance will show if he has transformed from a former military leader who ruled with an iron first, to a leader who respects the limitations of power. If General Buhari wins and President Jonathan and other powerful interests let him assume power, the nation would have successfully negotiated a frightful turning point in its life. President Jonathan will not need to give himself the title of statesman the way Obasanjo does.

 

3.          Professor Jega and INEC

Recent events demonstrate that the legally–backed independence of INEC is largely wishful thinking. It is, in fact, substantially dependent on the politicians who influence its operations and conduct; on the integrity of its leadership and management; and on a political culture that breeds perceptions that it is not possible to do the right thing in Nigeria. Yet INEC presently holds the key either to a future full of apprehension, or one that will restore hope that Nigerians can rise to occasions and walk away from disaster. Professor Jega is a very important person in INEC, but there is a lot more to INEC than his disposition, personal will and courage. At this stage, INEC’s gameplan is out there. If the elections fail to hold, it will not be because INEC is not ready, but because forces greater than INEC say they will not hold. If they do hold, they will test the degree to which Jega and INEC are involved in the search for appropriate verdicts of history over them.

It is scary to contemplate the fact that the only thing standing between a nation that will go up in flames and descend to anarchy, and one that will survive the next few weeks with confidence, is that INEC must conduct an election that is so credible that no serious disputes will follow it. INEC is a veteran of subversion, from within and from external forces (truth being that these two are intimately related). Even if it still pleads complete innocence, it bears scars of the PVC controversy, the national security bogey; the failed assaults on its card reader; vicious attacks on the integrity and competence of Professor Jega by the ruling party, and God only knows what else is being contemplated. Either alone or with colleagues and a management team that recognizes the historic significance of these elections, Jega has soldiered on with plans to conduct the elections on 28^th March and April 11^th, and insists that if they become mired in controversy, it will not be because INEC has failed. Many Nigerians reserve their judgments, but pray he is right.

At no other time in the history of our nation had so much depended on one event and a process as our future does on the next elections. INEC has the unenviable task of frustrating all efforts to divert it’s attention, subvert its systems and processes and undermine its integrity. Most Nigerians will ardently hope and pray that it has learnt all the right lessons from its previous experiences. They will hope that every voter who wants to collect his PVC does so before the elections; that card readers work; polling and collating officers do not collude to rig the elections; its deployment of personnel and material is efficient; and it succeeds in keeping the military out of mainstream election activities. There will be no excuses for failure, and anything short of transparently credible elections will be visited with massive uprising in a nation already on its knees from violence. History beckons on Jega and his colleagues to write their places in it. They do not have control over all it takes to do this; but they will succeed to the extent that Nigerians feel that they have acted entirely on the side of a people who need evidence of honour and integrity in persons and institutions trusted with sensitive responsibilities. 

 

4.          The Armed Forces

For the first time in a long while, our armed forces are attracting applause and commendation from Nigerians as they appear to be winning the war against terror. For a military with a deserved pride in its past, it could not have been indifferent to a disastrous crash in its image and effectiveness. Its untidy involvement in the elections postponement saga has dipped its standing further in the eyes of many Nigerians. Rumoured attempts to procure a singing Shekau in order to hurt the political opposition will further damage its integrity and professionalism. It will require an emphatic defeat of Boko Haram and painstaking rebuilding of its capacities and values for the military to resume its place as an institution which has given our nation much of its backbone, even if it took wrong turns on a number of occasions.

The Nigerian military has another historic opportunity to march on the side of the people if it shuns the temptations and pressures to damage the democratic process by corrupting the electoral process or preventing the conduct of credible elections as scheduled. If its leadership decides to drag the entire institution to support a betrayal of national trust, what will be lost will be more than opportunities to surmount a critical hurdle by Nigerians. The military will be part of a conspiracy to plunge the nation into new depths of desperation from which it will be difficult to recover. This is not what military men and women signed for, and swore to avoid. There is a future which can provide security in a united and prosperous nation, but no institution is more critical in providing it than our men and women under arms.

Nigerians have sympathized with a once proud and competent military when it became clear that it has been badly let down by the present political leadership. There will be no excuse or sympathy for our military if it lends itself as willing tool to a class of politicians who will render it and other Nigerians worse victims of its own failings and designs. The military has pulled many national chestnuts out of the fire in the past. The verdict of history will ignore its sacrifices to preserve the unity and survival of our nation if it fails to show the highest levels of commitment to the national interest, which is currently entirely manifest in the need for a free and fair election. An overly-political role by military will make this impossible to achieve. The nation will hope that the entire military institution will stand up against abuse of its hallowed values and traditions, and face the future with courage and confidence in a nation that will survive its current challenges and build its future with a strong and professional armed forces.

 

5.          The International Community

The global community has been worried by the paralyzing circumstances in which Nigeria has been plunged in the last few years, because our nation represents so many positive values as an leading African and important developing nation. Those that have followed our history and leadership role, as well as the capacities and potentials of our key institutions are bewildered by the spectacular inroads which terror, corruption and weak leadership have made in our lives. They have followed the painful journey to our present crossroads, and they are holding their breadth to see if we will survive and re-build our nation, or descend lower into chaos and uncertainty. The global environment is replete with wrecks and skeletons of states that made series of successive blunders. Many have been sunk by ambitions of rulers who think they are greater than the people; some took their unity and survival for granted; some failed to strike at the right balance between what is practical and what is necessary; and a few had no helping hand during their moments of needs.

Nigerians cannot accuse the world of indifference or hostility. We are generally perceived by the world as an intensely proud people who are used to solving our problems. Still, many nations with stakes in our security and economic wellbeing have agonized over our seeming inability to pull out of our current challenges. A few appear to have turned their backs on us, angry that we dropped the ball at critical moments. Some wonder how a nation with Nigeria’s military, its huge economic and human endowments, as well as an enviable record as survivor can be helped.

The world has found an entry point through our democratic process. This is a door we cannot shut, unless we embark on a dangerous path of living outside the demands of constitutional democracy. Our elections are therefore everyone’s business, and this time the world believes we are at a point when our democracy will undergo its most servere stress test. There is a huge store of private concern that we may not pull through, and a long queue of help, assistance and counsel on helping the electoral process to deliver a verdict that will be respected by Nigerians and save our nation from going deeper into distress. Our weaknesses have created gaping holes in our integrity and capacity to limit foreign interference, and we are now spoken to will the most minimal of respect and decorum. A few countries are lining up to claim credit for delivering on credible elections which will be the first in which an incumbent president will lose. That credit will not be theirs. It will belong to Nigerians, but it will not stop a global celebration of the triumph of global pressure on an important nation to pull back from the brink. It will take a while for Nigeria, under an effective and respected leadership, to restore the balance between appropriate international roles in our affairs, and our right as a people to manage our affairs and solve our problems. Until then, the global community will and should sustain its vigilance over the forthcoming elections, and work with INEC and Nigerians to ensure that the elections are credible, and politicians respect the outcomes. Nigeria can rise again and reclaim its pride of place in the global community. When that happens, the whole world will be the better for it. A severely distressed Nigeria is a major liability to global security.

Conclusion

It is perfectly conceivable that the March/April elections will pass with the most minimum of disputes and new leaders will emerge and lead the nation along the path of greater national security and unity. Sadly, the opposite is also a distinct possibility. What is clear is that Nigerians know all the options being contemplated. The elections can be postponed on grounds of national security, using a pliant legislature and massive inducements. This option merely buys a little time for a leadership that could become desperately mired in more dangerous schemes to stay in power. It will be violently resisted, and will drag the armed forces directly into fighting the Nigerian people. Or, the elections can be so massively rigged, even the international community with its very low bar for Nigerian elections, could reject the outcome. The government that will emerge from rigged elections will literally declare a war on Nigerians. And it will lose, sooner or later. And then, there is the possibility that many Nigerian leaders and elders will prevail on President Jonathan, the armed forces and security agencies and interests that are terrified of change to allow for credible elections and an orderly transition. This tiny group can make a major difference, and their places in history will reserve what they do or fail to do now as its final verdict. For Nigeria, history will record whether we move beyond this election to build national consensus and strategies on dealing with Boko Haram, fighting impunity, curbing corruption, improving how we live with each other like a coat of many colours; or whether we succumb to the temptation to risk further decline and damage because a few of us place themselves above the nation.

              Concluded.

 

 

 

 

 

_____________________________________________________*    Text of a contribution at the Kaduna Roundtable, 22^nd February, 2015.

 

Unforced errors

“The chief cause of problems is solutions.”

                                                                   Eric Sevareid

Usually limited to the sport of tennis, an unforced error refers to bad play made entirely as a result of a player’s blunder, and not because of an opponent’s skills or effort. Applied to politics, unforced errors do not have the luxury of being isolated from pressure, prompting or stress in engaging an opponent. Nonetheless, the analogy makes sense when the scale of the misjudgement or error is of such nature or significance that it gives your opponent an undeserved advantage, or places you at risks you could or should have avoided. There are many instances of political unforced errors these days, perhaps owing to the slippery grounds on which all players play, or the absence of good intelligence, stamina or skills among the players. Some of the errors our politicians and leaders make these days will cost the nation very dearly. While they will only lose nominations and elections, some of their mistakes could lose the nation excellent opportunities to fix its current problems, and give it a stronger foundation for future generations to build upon.

          Take the case of the claimed breakthrough by the federal government in its fight against Boko Haram in the form of an agreement to cease hostilities, presumably as a step towards a negotiated resolution. The announcement came from the federal government, a party in the war that has had the upper hand in the last few weeks; looks like it is successfully marshalling all its assets for a final onslaught, and still has large populations and territory in the hands of terrorists it appears to be defeating. Even making legitimate allowances for the fact that the government knows something we do not, the acceptance of a ceasefire with an opponent seemingly on the run is bound to raise more than eyebrows. Those among us who thought the administration deserves some trust had our goodwill shattered just a few hours into the trumpeted ceasefire when the insurgents took over new territory and population, slaughtering many locals to make the point that nothing has changed. 

Perhaps our military hierarchy really had thought it had a binding agreement, and had instructed its forces not to fight? No matter. The insurgents bombed the claim that there was a ceasefire, and then the walls collapsed on the claim that a credible ceasefire was signed from the outrage and cynicism of just about everyone who should know. Local communities, people with knowledge of the insurgency and critical analysts who had seen it all before said either the administration had been deceived again, or it is involved in another game of deception. The word so far is that bombs are going off from both sides and villagers are being slaughtered even as Jonathan’s administration sticks to the idea that it has a credible ceasefire agreement. Our troops will now fight to defend themselves and prevent further inroads into our territories while people make money putting forward characters that claim to represent Boko Haram, and our population in captured territories or kidnapped citizens begin to wonder if they are being bargained away.

          Or take the case of the quiet but intense drama going on in the upper achelons of the APC, the type that will give it the nation to run in 2015, or give the PDP another four years from 2015. For a party that a few months ago was virtually guaranteed victory against the PDP, the APC is now fighting for its dear life. Everything is threatening to come unstuck, and unless you count the massive invasion by former PDP members into the APC as moles, most of the problems of the APC today are self-inflicted. There were small errors, faulty assumptions and miscalculations here and there, all made in the euphoria which followed the historic merger of major opposition parties which have now grown into massive problems. The acute shortage of time to resolve them is being compounded by the intense pressure from very powerful interests within the party to shape it after their ambitions. The hitherto unassailable position of General Buhari is now being openly challenged by people who, this time last year, were not even in the party. Atiku, as is rumoured, may very well be in the game to retire Buhari finally and permanently from politics, but all three careers (Buhari’s, Atiku’s and Kwankwaso’s) could come to a tragic end if something dramatic and unusual does not happen to save the party from a damaging contest for the APC flag. PDP will not need to defeat APC in 2015: APC will lose all by itself in the manner it mismanages the great opportunity it has to change the course of Nigerian democracy. 

          Another unforced error that may only be manifest in the next few weeks will be in the candidature of President Jonathan.  PDP big wigs think that they have acted in the tradition of their party which insists that you cannot say no to an incumbent president when he demands for another go. They went through the usual motion of mowing down all internal challenges, breached all the rules relating to campaigning, and they think they are now ready to face whoever and whatever APC throws at them. The PDP will not reveal its plan B, assuming, that is, it has one. 

So you have to speculate whether it has contingency plans for the distinct possibility that the Supreme Court could strike down Jonathan’s eligibility as a candidate in 2015. How does it plan to deal with rebellious first-term governors, senators and other legislators who now want a Jonathan treatment? How does it handle governors who want to choose successors? How would it handle fallouts from serving senators who will resist pack-and-go orders because outgoing governors want their seats? With its no-going-back-on-Jonathan posture, and assuming that he does cross the eligibility hurdle, does the PDP have all answers to APC’s challenge? Could it have boxed itself into a corner by assuming that the APC will only field Buhari, and that it is inconceivable that Jonathan will lose to him? Could the party be guilty of underrating Buhari’s popularity or potential to limit his electoral shortcomings; and overrating Jonathan’s acceptability and the capacity of campaign managers to deliver on promises to weaken resistance against him in many parts of the nation? How would PDP react to the possible emergence of a dark horse from APC, a northern Christian, a southern Muslim or a southern Christian from the Niger Delta as candidates? How flexible is PDP strategy, beyond the assumption that massive amounts of money can make major differences in the manner voters behave, INEC conducts elections, the direction security agents wield sticks and guns, and the judiciary is inclined?

          Politicians do not have the luxury of taking decisions in a vacuum. They make good and poor judgment calls, and reap the benefits or pay huge prices for them. Because politics is about life, limbs and livelihoods, the public is usually the victim or beneficiary of failures or success of decisions of politicians. At this moment in our history, so much depends on the manner our leaders and politicians appreciate the total context of their actions and decisions. Unfortunately it is also the case that those who lead our nation and are about to determine its future have not demonstrated the levels of competence, commitment and vision that will guarantee that our fears over 2015 and beyond are misplaced.