Re: Much ado about IBB

I am also a law abiding Nigerian citizen and a patriot.  But were the Acting President Goodluck Jonathan to declare for the presidency and his only opponent is Ibrahim Babangida, I would support the former. I prefer Jonathan’s cabal to Babangida’s satanic cabal which is ignorant of the irreducible minimum concessions requirements to build and […]

I am also a law abiding Nigerian citizen and a patriot.  But were the Acting President Goodluck Jonathan to declare for the presidency and his only opponent is Ibrahim Babangida, I would support the former. I prefer Jonathan’s cabal to Babangida’s satanic cabal which is ignorant of the irreducible minimum concessions requirements to build and sustain a nation.  Can any cabal be worse than the one that allegedly forced the hand of Babangida in annulling the June 12 election?

Dr. Mato, talking about the Acting President, said “this is humility”.  Jonathan is humble, Mato concedes. Is Babangida humble? Babangida is anything, but humble. He has shown no single example of humility because it is not in his character, otherwise he would not have sprang on us the tasteless and rude statement he made in Asaba, to wit – “the speculation (of his presidency) is correct”.     Dr. Mato, of course, has every right to chip in his views and take sides on the Babangida debate but he must not lend his fine intellect to such a worthless venture as Babangida’s quest for presidency.  Just what exemplary leadership was Babangida showing when he sat back at the Aso Rock Villa eating apple at a time all the Nigerian Universities were closed down due to an unprecedented strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) that lasted for about eight months?

In any case, Babangida will again lose the nerves to contest for the presidency, come 2011.  He will come up with another excuse to stand down, after all Goodluck Jonathan or any other candidate that emerges will also be his brother.  Whatever happens, Babangida will drop out of the race. The 2011 presidential contest is not about who loves power most, ala Babangida.  It is about who has fresh new ideas to solve our perennial problems.  

I have a serious stake in the Nigerian project. I also pay my tax, in fact, from the source.  I may not be speaking for the people but I do not live far outside the society.  Contrariwise, I live in the society and I am not too elitist. But I am not going to support a replay of a corrupt, deceitful and incompetent government that made life miserable for us and robbed us of our future.  If anything, we have a duty to ensure that our children are not visited with another spectre of economic mismanagement, political deception, social disunity and moral bankruptcy.

If Gani Fawehinmi (may Allah bless his soul) were alive, the struggle to stop Babangida would not have entertaining, it would have been bitter.  Gani was no armchair critic; he had always had all the statistics to back his claims.  Gani had the statistics of the duration of the foreign trips of President Obasanjo and he had mentioned the number of days, nay months that Obasanjo had chalked up in the name of official trips abroad in his eight-year presidency.  I also wish Gani Fawehinmi was alive. Dr. Mato abdicates his responsibility when he writes. “If IBB is in a position to do that (set goals and refocus the nation), let him come out”.

As a renowned political scientist, Dr. Mato has a duty to lead the discourse to ascertain, dispassionately, whether Babangida has what it takes to put Nigeria on the path of growth and development.  He could do this by analysing Babangida’s past attempt at “re-engineering” Nigeria or he could share with us what new fresh ideas or innovations the former despot is bringing with him from Minna. In my own opinion, considering Babangida’s antecedents, it will be calamitous to trust him with power again.  At nearly 70, with a tired brain and exhausted limbs, we will be doomed to hand the presidency to Babangida.  In 1993, when it mattered most, Babangida failed to provide leadership for our country.  He ran away to Minna and could not even wait for the military pull out ceremony.  If the end result of rotating presidential power to the North is to confer it on Babangida, then it had better been retained down south. In the meantime, Babangida is well advised to hold on to and enjoy the comfort of his Minna mansion and allow other patriots to lead the nation.

Ajakku contributed from No. 19, Shantali road, Kofar Kola, Birnin Kebbi.