Buhari and Tinubu: Credit where it is due
Almost everything that can be said in the moment has already been said about the passing of former President Muhammadu Buhari two weeks ago. And yet, there is one thing left unsaid. I thought President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his government did great in handling the situation, and that too should be said. People die […]
Almost everything that can be said in the moment has already been said about the passing of former President Muhammadu Buhari two weeks ago. And yet, there is one thing left unsaid. I thought President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his government did great in handling the situation, and that too should be said.
People die every day, but not presidents. Of the eight billion plus people on the planet, only a handful ever had the honour of being presidents of their countries, in office or out of it. Only a handful will ever have that honour, in fact, relative to the wider population, even in countries where the turnover of leaders and their life expectancy are high. The Oval Office is a storied place, for example, but only five living Americans have ever sat at its desk, including the current occupant, Donald Trump, out of a total population of more than 340 million. We are a country of more than 230 million here in Nigeria, but only six living citizens among us have been president or head of state, including President Tinubu.
Presidents, in short, do not often get to bury one of their own, and we can assume that it is a solemn occasion for them when they have to, as indeed a president must someday. But it is rarer still for a sitting president to bury their immediate predecessor after the latter has left office, unlike for a president who rises to the post because their immediate predecessor died in post, as in the case of Presidents Jonathan and Yar’adua, for example, which is still fairly more common. This is what makes President Tinubu’s situation even more remarkable at the time of Buhari’s death, but also what makes his overall handling of Buhari’s death an important subject of reflection and comment in its own right.
When I saw the picture of Tinubu waving a final goodbye to Buhari’s body draped in our national flag just before the latter was laid into the ground, a thousand thoughts flooded my mind. That picture itself is an iconic piece that deserves a place in Nigeria’s annals of presidential history, if we ever have or value such a thing. What was Tinubu thinking at that very moment? Only he would know.
The relationship between Tinubu and Buhari is unlike between any two people we have ever seen in Nigerian politics, and would easily count as the most special of all political and personal relationships between any two leaders in our short history so far, at least in terms of its consequence for both men. Fate and mutual ambition brought them together, and since at least 2013, both men have been at the topmost centre of Nigerian politics in a way no two politicians have ever been.
When they met, the only consideration that mattered was how to help each other attain that personal ambition: to become Nigerian president. That very strong and faithful commitment by either man to help each other attain the highest office in the land is unique and unprecedented in Nigerian politics, and represents one sense in which their relationship counts as the most special in our politics to date.
That it came to pass almost exactly as planned, whether written or not, is another sense in which their relationship is the most special so far. Without Tinubu, Buhari would not have been president, since he tried three times previously without success. Tinubu’s contribution to Buhari’s eventual rise to the presidency is repeatedly drummed up in our ears, but the reverse is just as true. Without Buhari, Tinubu would not have been president either, for, in the context of Nigeria, an incumbent president who does nothing to harm your chances of succeeding him has done enough to help them, even if they lifted not a finger more. Buhari does not owe Tinubu any more than he paid back.
That is also the third sense of special in their relationship, namely that they stayed true to each other till the end, in a field where personal betrayals are about the only constant that exists. Buhari had stayed true to Tinubu not just by not working against him in the 2023 election, but also in the most unpredictable way possible: by not dying in office. Had Buhari died just a few years before he did, Tinubu would have tested the worst betrayal of his entire life, and would scarcely have recovered from it, given former Vice President Osinbajo’s role in the APC 2023 primaries.
For his part, Tinubu has stayed true to Buhari in the best ways possible. Throughout Buhari’s eight years in office, including the turbulent months in hospital in Britain, Tinubu was careful not to show a negative hand. Even his “emilokan” speech was more an exasperated assertion of their special relationship than a public criticism. Moreover, for all the negative comments others in his government have made about Buhari’s administration, Tinubu himself has not uttered a word in criticism of his predecessor’s government. If anything, he has only last week said that he accepts both the assets and liabilities of his predecessor equally. That statement that should be warning to some of Tinubu’s rather sharp-mouthed, some would say foul-mouthed appointees, on social media.
But it is during the period of death that Tinubu demonstrated his highest level of loyalty and commitment to Buhari, and that, I think, merits commendation. Tinubu was out of the country when the news reached him, but he immediately flew back home, perhaps at some risk to his own health. And unlike our tin pot governors, many of whom chartered private jets for the occasion, Tinubu went to Daura from Katsina and returned by road, again at some risk. He declared a day of holiday to mourn a president who was no longer on seat. Tinubu himself, his Vice President, Kashim Shettima, his Minister of Information, Mohammed Idris, and the entire government were front and centre throughout Buhari’s funeral.
Tinubu then held a special Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting at which he spoke so loftily of Buhari you would think he was talking about his own mother. Even Tinubu’s inauguration speech lacked that level of energy and genuine purpose. His speech at that meeting preserved for all posterity what had always mattered the most above all else to Buhari throughout his 82 years on earth: his reputation as an honest and incorruptible person and leader. That Tinubu did so right in front of Buhari’s children is also more than noteworthy, whatever his motivation. Overall, I think Tinubu and his government earned plenty of plaudits for their handling of the situation, and that he put himself in pole position as the natural heir to Buhari’s political followership, if he wants it and knows how to claim it, and it is still not too late.
There is a lesson in all of these for former presidents and prospective presidents. Former President Obasanjo, for example, could learn a thing or two from this. No one worked for the elevation of both presidents Yar’adua and Jonathan than Obasanjo, yet no one worked harder to bring them down than him, and mostly for political expediency. Obasanjo’s approach, we now can learn from Tinubu and Buhari, lacks grace, the one thing presidents should extend to one another. But there is also a lesson here for former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and former Governor Peter Obi: where there is mutual trust and commitment between any two leading politicians, presidential batons can be exchanged in Nigeria, other things being equal. In the meantime, let us give credit where it is due.