The cabinet shake-up

But having spent an unspecified amount taking care of Yar’adua and not knowing his state of health, who loses if he is impeached? Truth is, Nigeria has lost a golden opportunity to invoke a constitution that would have shown that court interpretations and political will is all that is needed to finally get a desired […]

But having spent an unspecified amount taking care of Yar’adua and not knowing his state of health, who loses if he is impeached? Truth is, Nigeria has lost a golden opportunity to invoke a constitution that would have shown that court interpretations and political will is all that is needed to finally get a desired constitution and not the tortuous route of amendment currently being embarked upon by the legislature. This puerile argument and subtle blackmail that this is a northern presidency must stop. If the people of northern Nigeria were to pick a first eleven, Yar’Adua is unlikely to make the reserve seat. He was a PDP choice and remains a PDP albatross.

Be that as it may, the fact that Jonathan first sacked the National Security Adviser and then the cabinet, shows how much input he had into the decision-making process of the now much taunted Yar’adua-Jonathan presidency. You do not singularly dismantle a house built by consensus. Those who rushed to Ogbulafor for a PDP injunction against a Jonathan candidacy in 2011, represent nobody but themselves and their selfish ambitions. Judging by the way the PDP has carried on so far, Jonathan, may as well go ahead and vie for the presidency in 2011 and if anybody is not happy with it, what can they do? If he decides to run, he will be the candidate to beat. I can assure that even the mega party would be eager to woo Jonathan as a candidate because it is evident that in Nigeria, it is not issues or even personality that matters, it is the strategic economic interest of those who run the political show and the power of incumbency.

Every serious Nigerian knows that the sacked cabinet was a cabinet of loafers who largely failed to deliver when they had the opportunity to make the Yar’Adua presidency the best that they offered. Yes, Jonathan might not be able to transform the society in twelve months, but those who dare him to try, have forgotten that in politics, 24 hours is a long time. It is left to judgement if Jonathan finds any of the sacked ministers suitable for re-appointment. Of course, the choice of who gets reappointed is entirely his, but it would tantamount to political incongruity if the acting president believes that any of the old brooms is a loyal one. We must draw a clear line between loyalty and sychophantic opportunism. And we must disappoint those who believe that without them, Nigeria cannot move forward. This country of erudite and proficient 150 million cannot lack forty credible technocrats to run a competent government without recycling tried and tested but dead woods. For apostles of regionalism, it is my considered opinion that no tribe, tongue or creed in this country, no matter how small cannot afford to present one competent person to represent it, if that is what it takes to be a minister.

But frankly, judging by the areas that Nigerians generally feel is a priority for any government willing to make a mark and help stabilise a very shaky polity, Goodluck can look for other people to run his show and run it efficiently. I also have no quarrel with Jonathan running a script written by Theophilus Danjuma. The arrangement under which some northerners are more northern than others is a divisive political gimmick that has been used to retard the growth of our region and the nation at large. If the north was built as a monolithic entity by its founding fathers, its descendants must not redraw the map along other parochial lines. And that is not an endorsement of Danjuma as one possessing a level of sagacity to repreent northern or national interest.

This country may never move forward except it slaughters parochialism on the altar of service. The average Nigerian has no tribe, no region, in fact, no religion other than first to meet his needs. The inability to meet needs is at the root of all agitations including the asinine slaughter of one poor group by another in various guises.  For the nation to advance, all men and women of goodwill must ask ethnocentrists to shut their traps and let service be the yardstick for governance.