40 years of Obasanjo (II)
December 2006 was an auspicious month for the majority of the citizens of this country. That year the Muslim and Christian festivals fell within a few days of each other. Christmas, Boxing Day, Eid el Kabir, New Year, all came in close succession. The air, then, was full of widespread festivities. We had already done […]
December 2006 was an auspicious month for the majority of the citizens of this country. That year the Muslim and Christian festivals fell within a few days of each other. Christmas, Boxing Day, Eid el Kabir, New Year, all came in close succession. The air, then, was full of widespread festivities. We had already done with Christmas and were looking forward to the Sallah and New Year. But there was tension in the State House where I was posted since 1999 as a functionary in the Political Department of the Vice-President’s office.
On Thursday 28th I was on the way back to Abuja from Kaduna, hoping to stop in the markets on route to price rams, when somewhere after Jere town I was jolted with a call from a staff in my office that all offices for the political appointees serving in the office of the Vice Presidents were being locked up. It sounded incredulous to shut down the office of the Vice-President five months to the end of the tenure of the Administration. But it was common knowledge that there was no love lost between the two leaders, and somehow those of us within had seen this kind of thing coming, once the President, due to a long standing disagreement with his Deputy, had declared the office of the Vice-President vacant.
I revved up the engine of my car and was soon in the main building of the Federal Secretariat where the Political Department was quartered to bid farewell to my boss Prof A. D. Yahaya, the Political Adviser. From there I drove down into the Villa and went straight to the Vice-President’s wing hoping to meet and say goodbye to the staff, with whom we had a close interaction for the past many years. I was shocked to find the entire wing silent and all the offices locked up. This was a Thursday afternoon when that wing would be at its busiest, with all manner of people – Governors, Ministers, legislators, other high ranking officials, businessmen, etc – milling around. The human traffic in this wing had always been the densest in the Villa but that afternoon there was just silence. I realized that I was witnessing some of the final acts of unravelling of a Presidency that held a beacon of hope for the country when it came.
Perhaps no Nigerian President had ever come to the office as prepared as Obasanjo did in 1999. He had been Head of State before, in the late 1970s, and retired a hero with his reputation intact. In the interregnum of twenty years before his return to power in 1999, Obasanjo had not just been idly reminiscing in the Otta farm he retired to, near his ancestral home of Abeokuta. He kept himself busy, reading, writing and keeping his nose always close to current issues revolving around the country and globally. He was heavily engaged in the council of former heads of states which comprised then with people like former German Chancellor, Helmut Schmidt, former British Prime Minister, Jim Callaghan, former Australian Prime Minister, Malcolm Fraser, former U S President Gerald Ford, former Colombian President, Miseal Pastrana Borrero and others. He co-chaired with Malcolm Fraser the Commonwealth Eminent Persons Group on Apartheid South Africa which worked assiduously behind the scenes to help unravel that heinous political system.
Probably the most important step he took after leaving office was the establishment of the Africa Leadership Forum (ALF) in Otta, which he got his former Minister of Economic Development, then incumbent Executive Secretary, UN Economic Commission for Africa, Dr Adebayo Adedeji to help him set up. The ALF became a centre for leadership advocacy and training. One of the programs he ran was the Farm House Dialogue which became famous in 1980s as an informal platform which facilitated interaction between groups within Nigeria and across African countries. He even attracted other world leaders such as former U S President Jimmy Carter, former World Bank President Robert McNamara, former Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere and former German Chancellor, Helmut Schmidt to participate. At a time he even got Nigerian President Ibrahim Babangida to give a keynote address in one of the events organised by AFL. These engagements at the AFL kept Obasanjo close to the issues and even closer to top national and international analysts that were always invited to Otta farm. The relaxed ambiance of the farm made it convivial for Obasanjo to reflect and draw out his memoirs which from his view established his place in history not only as a key Commander during the civil war but also as a prominent participant in the Gowon regime, and then military leader of the country thereafter who handed over government to an elected President.
Those reflections in the serene surroundings of Ota, those constant engagements both within and outside the country and the associations and friendships he had garnered over these years both within and outside the country made his second coming to government a unique experience for the nation. He came into the Villa confident that he had a cure for every ailment afflicting the nation and surely enough he was seen in the company of people whose credentials inspired confidence to help him do that.
The appointment of his aides and Ministers and their postings were well spread which clearly showed his hands as an adroit political operator. For the first time Nigeria had a leader no one could accuse of nepotism or ethnic and religious biases. And he was decisive, quickly showing officials who did not measure up to the doors and replacing them immediately. He came up with an Economic Team, actually a kitchen cabinet of twelve bright younger fellows, prominent amongst were Ngozi Iweala, Oby Ezekwesili, El-Rufa’i, Bode Agusto, Funso Kupolokun, and Charles Soludo, whom the President gave an unusual access to discuss, and, as time went on, to implement policy with him.
With immediate effect he also had General Joseph Garba, a renowned diplomat, who was Foreign Minister when Obasanjo was Head of State and thereafter Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, installed as Director General, National Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Kuru. Obasanjo had established NIPSS in 1979 and personally tailored it along the Royal College of Defence Studies of London which made a deep impression on him when he was a participant there in 1974. In the early days into his first term he made NIPSS to be the hub for overall policy initiation, where he regularly ferried his Ministers and aides for retreat to spend days swotting over what policies were appropriate for moving the nation forward.
He also inherited a State House structure that had been in use since the heydays of the military in government in 1970s. This structure gave the Deputy (Chief of General Staff in the military era and now Vice-President in these dispensations) sufficient bureaucratic legroom to operate, complete with a separate budget and a complement of staff to run it. The system automatically cranks up to full utilization whenever the President was away as Obasanjo was in most of the early days of his administration. He had Atiku Abubakar as Vice-President whom many regarded as a more complete politician who could be counted upon to lead the troops in the absence of the President.
With all these in place, a confident Obasanjo set about changing the face of Nigeria. In many respects he did, with reforms manifesting in virtually all sectors of our national life. By all estimation Obasanjo was setting up a tough act to follow. However things unravelled in the second term affecting the succession and the survival and sustenance of the Obasanjo legacy. Closing the office of the Vice-President was one of such, among others. We shall conclude next week.