Garba Deen, el-Rufai and 2011

I must thank Garbadeen for his courage and integrity in acknowledging that he used to write extremely critical articles against el-Rufai but having compared him with others, he now realises that the man is not as bad as he used to think of him. For some of us who are admirers of the former FCT […]

I must thank Garbadeen for his courage and integrity in acknowledging that he used to write extremely critical articles against el-Rufai but having compared him with others, he now realises that the man is not as bad as he used to think of him. For some of us who are admirers of the former FCT minister, we thank God that Garbadeen has finally seen the light and can now see what some of us had seen in el-Rufai: a competent, courageous, intelligent and patriotic Nigerian who wants his nation to move forward as quickly as possible.

Some times a people need time to compare certain public officers with their successors in order to have a correct assessment of such persons. Our people have a saying that it is only when a man is married to more than one wife that he will know which of his women loves him most. The man may realise that it is in fact, his first wife who loves him dearest. Without the benefit of time and comparison with others he may not acknowledge this truth.

This is obviously what has happened to Garbadeen and some other Nigerians who used to see el-Rufai in unflattering light. As I said earlier, it is good that with the benefit of hindsight, Garbadeen and others now see el-Rufai in positive light and even consider him a suitable material for the presidency of our country.

Some of us have seen long ago that el-Rufai is a material that can make a very good President for Nigeria, a country that has unfortunately been saddled with a succession of inept, corrupt, unfocused, clueless and unpatriotic leaders

Some who did not have a correct assessment of el-Rufai used to see him as an arrogant, wicked and self-opinionated man who felt he knew it all. The truth of the matter however is that el-Rufai was motivated to act in a seemingly brash manner because of his impatience with the slow or do-nothing way we run our country.

I do not entirely blame people like Garbadeen who bitterly disliked the style rather than the substance which el-Rufai adopted to advance his reformative agenda while he was FCT minister. As a people, we are complacent, lethargic and given to not rocking the boat. We also believe in not touching sacred cows even if we all know that they are rotten crooks. When el-Rufai came on board, he was determined to make a substantial difference. This accounted for what looked like arrogance, disrespect for certain untouchables and insensitivity to the plight of others who were to be hurt by some of his corrective measures adopted to bring the monumental changes he brought to the FCT. We all know that if you want to make an omelet you must be ready to break eggs. Without pain, you cannot have gain, so goes another saying.

If el-Rufai came to the FCT job with the usual Nigerian spirit, Abuja would today be one huge slum city. He needed to inflict what looked then like callous pain in order to restore for us a city that was frighteningly going to the dogs

el-Rufai is a man of action. If he sees a problem, his instinct is that such a problem be confronted radically and fixed rather than spend valuable time either bemoaning our fate or trading blames. This is surely the type of leader Nigeria needs as her president come 2011. My sincere plea is that influential voices such as those of Garbadeen and other journalists should join us in actively calling on Nigerians to see el-Rufai as the next president Nigeria should have in 2011.

The media and all those Nigerians who are perceptive enough to know what is good for Nigeria have a responsibility to promote the candidacy of el-Rufai. We must not leave this to politicians who will not be enthusiastic to have a man like el-Rufai as president because his tenure will not be business as usual for them to loot and do nothing for the people.

el-Rufai is not in any way a saint. Like all humans, he has his faults. But for some of us, his merits outweigh his demerits and I think that is what really matters in making political choices in the national interest. Does the man have less faults and more virtues? We want a performer, a man with a can-do spirit. We want a man of courage. We want a man with the exuberance of youth. We want a man that is above average in intelligence and whose sense of judgment you can rely upon. El-Rufai has all these presidential qualities and many more. Let us encourage him to come out and when he does, let us support him to become president of Nigeria come 2011.

Abdullahi is a public affairs analyst and lives at Karu Federal Housing Estate.