APC by day, PDP by night
APC National Working Committee’s stunning disqualification of two Buhari Administration ministers from the list of aspirants cleared to contest yesterday’s governorship primaries was a combination of the understandable and the incredulous. That Communications Minister Adebayo Shittu was not cleared to pursue his desperate aspiration to become the governor of Oyo State stood to reason. Shittu […]
APC National Working Committee’s stunning disqualification of two Buhari Administration ministers from the list of aspirants cleared to contest yesterday’s governorship primaries was a combination of the understandable and the incredulous. That Communications Minister Adebayo Shittu was not cleared to pursue his desperate aspiration to become the governor of Oyo State stood to reason. Shittu was accused of dodging the NYSC after he graduated from the Nigeria Law School in 1979. He did not deny the charge but made the sensationally illogical claim that going to the Oyo State House of Assembly that year was a form of national service.
Minister of Women Affairs Mrs. Jummai Alhassan’s disqualification however raised eyebrows. Unlike Shittu, for whom APC’s NWC promptly provided a reason for his disqualification, none was provided in her case. It was only later on Friday that APC national chairman Adams Oshiomhole said at a press conference that she was disqualified because of suspected divided loyalty. He said, “Someone is probably APC in the daytime…and they are PDP at heart or if they are not PDP at heart, they are actually and simply a follower of a one-man permanent presidential candidate…”
Assuming that was what Madam Taraba did, what was wrong with divided loyalty, which is a major attribute of the Nigerian national character? Some Nigerians are monotheists by day and traditional polytheists by night, such as the Oyo lawmaker recently caught by vigilantes, stark naked, taking a ritual bath in the bush in the middle of the night. Other Nigerians are democrats by day and autocrats or even despots by night. Yet more Nigerians are technologically savvy by day and they are superstitious by night. Many Nigerian men of God by day are actually men of mammon by night. Why is it that many Nigerian ex-servicemen, who spent decades in the security forces protecting law and order, suddenly become spearheads of intercommunal warfare once they are back home in retirement? They deploy all their military and police skills in the service of inter-communal killings.
Nigerian political parties demand fidelity from members more than almost all other institutions. From the Second Republic onwards, Nigerian politicians invented the phrase “anti-party activity” which they made the equivalent of blasphemy in religion. In contrast, business groups in Nigeria do not go about accusing their fellows of anti-business activity. The closest they come to doing that is to place a small advert in a newspaper saying “the person whose photograph appears below is no longer in the employ of so-and-so company. Anyone who transacts business with him does so at his or her own risk.” That is more polite.
Social clubs in Nigeria have never accused anyone of anti-club activity. Professional associations, of which Nigeria has a couple hundred, have never accused their members of anti-medical, anti-legal, anti-economics, anti-shippers, anti-aviation or anti-chemistry activity. Even ASUU, the most restive of our unions, does not accuse members of anti-academic activity. The last time Nigeria Labour Congress [NLC] accused anyone of anti-labour activity was in 1981 when it branded the then leader of the Nigeria Civil Service Union, David Ojeli, a “traitor.”
Student unions, which three decades ago were the most militant groups in Nigeria, do not often accuse members of anti-student activity, except for one memorable case. In 1990, the Students Parliament of the University of Jos sacked two union officers. Their offense? It said they were “pro-government and pro-SAP,” the hated Structural Adjustment Program of the IBB era. Nigerian NGOs too have many cases of their members by day hobnobbing with rival NGOs by night. In 1996 I attended a UNDP seminar in Bauchi which discussed the weak state of NGOs in the country. The communique committee proposed that we adopt a resolution saying people should be told not to be withdrawing from NGOs. The session’s chairman, the late Professor Kyari Tijjani, firmly ruled out that recommendation. He said, “NGOs are voluntary associations. If you join an NGO and you find that you do not like what is happening, the best thing to do is to withdraw.” I think the same rule applies to political parties, provided one does not belong to more than one of them at a time.
Even Nigerian religious groups, the most self-assured of all social organisations, do not rush to accuse members of anti-religious activity. Not too long ago in Imo State, priests and laity of Ahiara Diocese rejected a Bishop appointed by the Vatican. At one point they were on the verge of repudiating a directive from the Pope to accept a new Bishop. The Vatican’s Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith did not rush to recommend their ex-communication and instead accepted a settlement. If Oshiomhole were the Archbishop in charge, he would have quickly described Ahiara priests as Catholics by day and [literal] protestants by night.
The main evidence that APC had against Mama Taraba, as far as the public knows, was the Sallah homage she paid to Atiku Abubakar two years ago, during which she declared support for his presidential aspiration. Maybe APC has other evidence but that one alone should not be used against her because she did not resign from APC or the Buhari Cabinet to follow Atiku when he defected to PDP. She should have been forgiven because people often say things that they don’t mean. In 1986, the great French footballer Michel Platini said just before that year’s World Cup finals that he will commit suicide if France did not win the trophy. When France was knocked out of the semi-finals, there was a memorable cartoon in a Nigerian newspaper, of the Angel of Death hovering over the French team and asking who it was that had an appointment with him.
Now, just because Mama Taraba did not follow through on her pledge to support Atiku’s ambition, why should that be a surprise? Atiku himself famously said when he defected from PDP to APC in 2013 that it was his last bus stop. The fact that he caught another bus four years later, back to PDP, only elicited laughs across Nigeria, since we never believe what politicians say in the first place. There was this tale that someone once posted on WhatsApp, that a plane load of politicians crashed and locals promptly buried all of them. When policemen arrived at the scene, they asked a local farmer if no passenger survived the crash and he said, “Some of them claimed that they were alive but you know these politicians. They can tell lies.”
Afterall, who is ever completely loyal to a political party, especially these days when the parties are bereft of ideology, policy or program? Two brothers recently stood as APC and PDP candidates in the Katsina North by-election, which tested their neighbours’ loyalties to breaking point. Rumours were flying around in the recent Osun election that some APC governors bankrolled the PDP candidate in order to whittle down the influence of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. I do not know if the allegation was true.
Look at the damage that Oshiomhole caused to one of the most budding political ambitions in Nigeria. With one swipe of his acerbic tongue, he destroyed Nigerian women’s best chance to produce an elected governor, something that has not yet happened in this Republic. Mama Taraba is trying to displace a PDP governor so the option of going to PDP was out. She therefore had to pick the ticket of the non-descript UDP. If her tweet on Saturday night is to be believed, she immediately transformed UDP into a party to reckon with in Taraba State because most APC state and local officials defected with her to the new party.
The biggest gainer in all these is Governor Darius Ishaku, who must be smiling to the polls. The challenge to his second term bid has greatly receded. To that extent, Oshiomhole could be charged with anti-party activity. He is APC’s chairman by day and the Taraba PDP’s best helper by night.