Merry Wailing!
“Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?” That was the question some followers of John the Baptist asked Jesus when they accosted him. John had been the voice crying in the wilderness and urging his fellow mortals to “prepare the way of the Lord, make His path straight”; […]
“Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?” That was the question some followers of John the Baptist asked Jesus when they accosted him. John had been the voice crying in the wilderness and urging his fellow mortals to “prepare the way of the Lord, make His path straight”; but when Jesus came and was often seen in the company of sinners, John had to send his disciples to go to Jesus and ask that important question, just to make sure.
In the same vein, this chronicler, having witnessed 18 months of the Buhari regime of change which I supported and still support – I must now ask President Muhammadu Buhari, “Are you the President we have been waiting for, or should we wait for another?”
Buhari must answer that question in all honesty because too many people have invested in his emergence as the face of Nigeria that he cannot afford to ignore the cries of the people in the customary ‘Nigerian’ manner. There are so many things Buhari could have done differently to achieve better results in all spheres. Those of us who invested in his emergence and put our integrity on the line must do him the favour now rather than when it is too late, of reminding him where we ought to be and what he ought to be doing. I had no apologies for supporting Buhari’s emergence; I don’t see why I should have one for giving pro bono advise now.
The most urgent task confronting the president is the much-awaited tweaking of his kitchen and parlour cabinets. Both the Chief of Staff and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation have serious albatrosses hanging on their necks. Following a spate of lurid allegations of graft against two prominent members of Buhari’s kitchen cabinet, Chief of Staff Abba Kyari who was said to have received a hefty bribe from MTN in return for a reduction in their fine for flouting the NCC regulations relating to registration of new SIM cards; and Secretary to the Government of the Federation Babachir David Lawal who has been comprehensively denounced by the Senate as having profited from the misery of IDPs through opaque contracts, Nigerians have been waiting for the president to act.
In the kind of Nigeria we envisaged when we were campaigning for Buhari to emerge president, Mallam Abba and Mr Babachir Lawal ought to have been sent on compulsory leave by now. This is not a matter of friendship or ‘man-know-man’. It has everything to do with the integrity of the president himself. You cannot be surrounded by opaque people and claim to be transparent. And there is a sense in which this is particularly relevant for Buhari because this is not his first time in our public consciousness.
It is generally agreed that Buhari is an upright man, but is his judgement in terms of kitchen cabinet and even the federal cabinet unimpeachable? Buhari took almost one year to name his cabinet. At the end, people had the impression that he was not prepared for the high office. Though uncharitable, considering the circumstances, that view was not totally unfounded. During Buhari’s first emergence on the national scene within the last hours of 1983, it was clear that he was a patriot, but he was also not street-wise. He therefore surrounded himself with people he thought had the same ideals with him. In reality, however, they were closet goalkeepers angling for a piece of the action.
It seems Buhari made the same mistake as boss of the PTDF when he surrounded himself with people he thought were clean but who turned out to have had their own klepto-agenda. Buhari has never been indicted. Nigerians generally perceive him as incorruptible. Love him or loathe him, you can’t dress him in the babanriga of a thief, not even in your imagination. But the gates of hell are paved with good intentions. It is not enough to say, ‘I mean well’ or ‘I won’t steal your money’. What is more important is to be one step ahead of the thieves – which is one area I give credit to the inventor of Babacracy, Olusegun Obasanjo, who proved that he was nobody’s spring chicken. Any kitchen cabinet member who is not squeaky clean should return to his village to play with his grandchildren.
Enough of excuses. Buhari should take responsibility for his decisions. Apparently he has made some mistakes in personnel recruitment. He should correct those errors immediately. That will clear the way for him to register for all time what I think will go down as his unimpeachable legacy – the fight against corruption.
The aftermath of the release of ex-governor James Ibori from a UK prison shows the seriousness of the problem of corruption the Buhari administration is fighting. Ibori emerged into the waiting hands of his beneficiaries comprising senators, Honourable Members, and other politicians of various colourings. Everyone was scrambling to congratulate the convict. Ibori is Santa Claus, Guardian Angle, Messiah and Deliverer all at once. One native slave from Delta State named Ogheneochukome Lolodi enthusiastically assailed the social media with his message:
“Dear Nigerian hypocrites, I am writing to inform you that James Onanefe Ibori, the Odidigboigboi of Africa, our brother, son, father, husband, uncle and friend will be celebrated once his release is confirmed. He is OUR thief, not yours.
Money is at the root of all this nonsense. We glorify money and those who have it regardless of how they acquired it. “Money is the barometer of a society’s virtue”, says Ayn Rand. “When you see that … money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favours – when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you – when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice-you may know that your society is doomed.”
May our country not be doomed! In this season of recession when wailers wail unendingly, merry wailing everyone!