Obasanjo: A hard act to follow?

The reforms Obasanjo initiated when he was elected President were widespread and covered virtually every aspect of public life. He spent the first many months of his two terms in studies and consultations as well as travels to all parts of the world and to institutions that he knew would further his good intentions for […]

The reforms Obasanjo initiated when he was elected President were widespread and covered virtually every aspect of public life. He spent the first many months of his two terms in studies and consultations as well as travels to all parts of the world and to institutions that he knew would further his good intentions for the country. His reforms actually began at the doorsteps of the public service which he recognized as the engine room through which all other positive changes will be carried through. He was lucky to have all the men he wanted in the places he wanted them to be.

He quickly filled up the key offices – Secretary to the Government, Head of Service, Chief of Staff and National Security Adviser – with those whom he had long working relationship with. It was in the case of selecting the Head of Service that Obasanjo found it difficult to make a choice. It was obvious that he did not know many of the Permanent Secretaries in the pool from whom he had to select a Head of Service. This is because when he was in Government in the 1970s this crop of Permanent Secretaries were unknown to him. They were probably just at the starting point of their careers and could not have worked directly with him. Nevertheless he had to make a choice and when his choice of Head of Service did not measure up in a few months of assessment, he was quickly dropped. Obasanjo then had an opportunity to settle for a thoroughbred, who went on to last the whole two terms with him.

As for his choice of Ministers, he had the good fortune to have known many of them for many years. However, due to the large number of Ministers mandated to be appointed by the constitution, he had to take on board some he did not know. Here too he was quick to assess the usefulness of a Minister and did not hesitate to replace or post him to a ministry where he would be more useful.

By the end of his first term he was further emboldened to unleash many members of the Economic Team that have been developing road maps in the kitchen cabinet under his personal supervision, to head key ministries and parastatals so as to realize his vision of what the Nigeria should look like. For example Ngozi went to Ministry of Finance, Oby to Solid Minerals and later to Education, El-Rufa’i to FCT, Nuhu Ribadu to EFFCC, Bode to Budget, Soludo to govern the Central Bank.  Wherever they were posted this special breed under took frenetic activities, not minding whose head was gored, knowing fully that they would be backed solidly by the President. There were spectacular results showing all around, ranging from transformation of the FCT, the clearance of our debts, monetization, cleaning up of the wage bill, NHIS, Pension scheme for the public service, consolidation of banks and raising their capital base, consolidation in the Aviation industry, strides in the mobile communication, etc. There were failures as well if one looked at the privatization exercises particularly as it affected the steel companies and NITEL. Of course the most spectacular failure one could point to was the power policy flip flop that has till today denied this country sufficient electricity to power our industries and daily life. 

Why is it that after almost ten years that the reforms initiated by Obasanjo reforms are yet to attained full fruition in many areas of our social endeavour. why are his acts so difficult to follow? The answers are varied. Opinions differ. Some people point to the quality of his successors, their experience in governance and their character. Many put the blame on the political landscape populated by political parties that have not ensured the emergence of the best in their selection systems. Probably this is so because the military that served as ombudsman in 1999 could no longer undertake such tasks again, for obvious reasons.

To worsen matters we are yet to develop any institution independent enough to do that. INEC is just inching towards taking up such a role but is yet to get there. As for the issue of succession in the State House the PDP that dominated the Federal Government for the first sixteen years in these dispensations must carry the can for the candidates that emerged after 2007 and Obasanjo who was leader at that time cannot escape blame.

As for me who had a ringside seat to view these developments from the very beginning I can almost touch the point where the problem started. At the beginning of the second term it became obvious to many observers that the President and the Vice President had serious disagreements and the State House that worked in unison before had fallen apart. Then followed a series of measures aimed at subsuming the office of the Vice-President into the larger State House, which would be controlled only at the orders of the President. Since the days of the Chief of General Staff during military regimes, as the office of the Vice-President was known, the office had always had a separate budget and an independent bureaucracy headed by a Permanent Secretary.

Dismantling the office of the Vice-President and pooling it along with the other parallel units into the larger State House was in my view administratively neat, but coming at that moment the purity of the motive became suspect. This became even more apparent as events unfolded. Clearly punitive measures were taken against the Vice-President, as members of his staff were fired at will and without consultations with him by the President. The flow of funds to the office of the Vice-President was also stifled making it difficult for the staff to even undertake the most mundane tasks.

It was obvious that chaos had descended on the State House at a time when the main actors needed to unite to see the reforms initiated by the President through. Thereafter matters came to the open with the Vice-President, pushed to the wall, showing open intransigence to the President leading to a final parting of ways.

With one leg of the Presidency broken and mangled, the overall effect on the Presidency was bound to be felt by the whole country. After all The Vice-President was the only other person elected among member of the cabinet, and who could be relied upon to command the respect of all other arms of the government, particularly the Legislature and the State Governors.

When he lost the support of the Vice-President, and realized also that he could not rid of him, Obasanjo must have decided to go it alone. To realize his vision of what the country should be, the President felt he had to take control of his Party to ensure that his preferred successor emerged to take off where he stopped. He also had to have a measure of control over the Legislative arm that would enact the laws leading to the wide-ranging reforms he envisaged.

The picture we have of Obasanjo has always been that of a strong man: a civil war hero, a military Head of State, a prisoner of conscience and then President. But at the tail end when he lost the Vice-President, who was his storm trooper he must have stumbled, and faltered, particularly in the choice of successor. But this has not negated the pre-eminence of his reforms programme that virtually changed the face of the nation. We cannot wholly blame him that his successors have found his act hard to follow.