It was a mixed
grill. To some, it was a case of too little, too late. But within the ruling
All Progressives Congress (APC), the recent meeting President Muhammadu Buhari,
had with the leadership of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), was a
refreshing development worthy of commendation.
Deputy National Chairman of APC (North), Senator
Shuaibu Lawal, was the first to exult the meeting, which he saw as the
threshold of a “new vista in Nigeria’s democracy.” The senator seemed overjoyed
at the possibility that the President has found, albeit belatedly, that “such
meetings demonstrate that political parties, irrespective of their ideologies
and status, could give necessary support to the government” or party in power.
But coming shortly after his return from a long
medical vacation in the United Kingdom, especially against the facetious
explanation by the president’s spokesman, Femi Adesina, that the meeting was at
the instance of the opposition, the meeting may after all, not represent a
beautiful flipside to the drab and draconian Buhari political style.
If the meeting was not the initiative of the
President, it must therefore be a mark of courtesy by the opposition to
sympathise with the ailing President on his health challenges in the true
African tradition.However, if indeed the meeting was set up by the President,
there is the possibility that it was precipitated by a number of factors, or
intended to achieve a new lease of soft politics. Whichever way, the meeting
has implications and ramifications, which are worth examining.
COULD it be that President Buhari, with the benefit
of three-month stay on the sideline, saw that his administration has not fared
commendably in office and decided to make amends by stoking a political
armistice?
But, the rapprochement pales into insignificance
when viewed against the backdrop of the political brickbats that have trailed
the administration. First, the President, prodded by a few powerful
individuals, now euphemistically referred to as a cabal, started shunning any
direct meeting with the South West caucus, which engineered the fall of PDP
from the pinnacle of political power.
Again, when the president’s leadership was needed
to moderate proceedings in the federal legislature, from where the essential
raw materials would be generated to deliver on the change mantra and other
prodigious promises made during the electioneering, Buhari played the ostrich.
Consequently, without a father figure to serve as a
clearing house for crucial decisions in both party and government, APC allowed
the country to totter in socio-political suspense. Many commentators hold the
opinion that it was the vacuum in leadership by the President that seemed to
have given APC the stature of a scalar quantity, having magnitude, but lacking
direction.The bridge building seems to be coming behind time, because the hate
and division within the polity was unwittingly nurtured by the President, who
looked askance while his partymen and loyalists continued to traduce the PDP
and blame the former ruling party for every mishap in the polity.
Even at the point of making his appointments, the
president went solo. He scaled up the separatist approach by announcing that
his leadership style would reflect the ignoble 97 to five per cent ratio
between those that voted for him, and those whose votes went elsewhere.
As such, when Shuaibu noted that APC was determined
not to squander the goodwill shown to it by Nigerians, he seemed to have lost
sight of the criticality of timing. It is often said that there is no second
chance to correct a first impression. Most Nigerians believe that APC and
President Buhari have squandered the prodigious fund of goodwill bestowed on
them by citizens, not only by dousing the gargantuan expectations from the
administration through denial, but through unconscionable buck-passing.
Apart from toeing the path of alibi, the President
scaled up the hate mongering that preceded the 2015 presidential election by
not offering alternatives through communication and association. Although the
deputy national chairman of the APC maintained that the meeting afforded the
President “a fresh opportunity to renew his call for national unity,” coming
more than two years into his four-year term, the fence mending may not bear
fruits that could mature before the next hostilities- 2019 election.
PRESIDENT Buhari’s meeting with the opposition
could also be seen as an afterthought, given the fact that while the leadership
crisis in PDP lingered (including insinuations of ruling party enabling of a
faction), the homes of judges were violated in a series of what the Department
of State Services (DSS) tagged “sting operations.”
There were also insinuations that at the height of
governorship election petitions against the opposition, the President was said
to have dismissed pressures from his associates for direct meddling in the
judicial process. It could therefore be argued that the surprising survival of
PDP in the legal challenge, as well as, discovery that the party garnered some
political taproots in its 16 years of dominance, must have predicated the
meeting.
Perhaps, it could be in that frame of thought that
chairman of the PDP National Caretaker Committee, Senator Ahmed Makarfi, in his
remarks at the meeting pointedly told the President that as opposition party,
“we shall keep you on your toes.”President Buhari is perceived, either rightly
or wrongly, as being impatient with democratic recourse to dialogue and debate,
especially given his body language that suggests nostalgia for his days as
military head of state.
Former governor of Sokoto State, Alhaji Attahiru
Bafarawa, noted in an interview with The Guardian that President Buhari failed
to understand the peculiar history of Nigeria. Bafarawa stressed that unlike
former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who engaged capable hands from across party
divides to run his administration, Buhari came into office with the mistaken
belief that he and his party men alone could solve the myriad of developmental
challenges facing the country.
The handshake with the opposition must have also come
from retrospection, particularly given that the management of the economy gave
out the administration as being ill-prepared and too rigid to accommodate
expert ideas.Perhaps, recalling how PDP grappled with the opposition antics of
ambushing its policies, the President must have realised the truism in the
saying that “better is the end of a venture than the beginning,” to convene the
meeting. But coming at such a time when much experimenting had gone into the
management of the political economy, as well as, the damage done to trust, the
presidential retreat succeeded in giving the impression that the President was
capable of rethinking his methods. Placed side-by-side with his national
broadcast shortly after his return, the meeting lacked imagination, because it
tended to offer a sort of public relations makeover to douse the pervading
frustration in the land.
MORE than two years after his inauguration,
President Buhari has never found time to sit with the members of his party to
iron out differences, or map strategies and action plans. APC has also not been
able to constitute its functional organs, especially the board of trustees. All
that goes to show that much was expected from the President, as such he could
have begun his new style of politics by reaching out to his party men and also
informing them of his decision to engage the opposition.
Short of underscoring the President’s penchant for
playing solo, the meeting with opposition appeared as a decoy to avoid
confronting the greater danger presented by the unease in APC. By failing to
uphold wisdom in the saying that charity begins at home, the President’s
meeting with PDP leaders ended up as an evasive manouvre.
If building some kind of understanding with the
opposition party was necessary for national cooperation, political peace and
economic progress, internal party cohesion ought to be the essential building
block. There was nothing to show that APC was carried along in the meeting,
because the lack of agenda was written on the faces of its national chairman,
Chief John Odigie Oyegun, and his colleagues in the party’s national working
committee.
Against that background, it would be safe to assume
that President Buhari appeared to test the waters for a possible emergence of
the much-talked about third force, comprising splinters from APC and PDP. This
is because within the APC amalgam, the fault lines separating the legacy or
merging parties remain glaring.
And words have been making the rounds that the
Buhari’s loyalist in the erstwhile Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), have
been meeting in search of modalities to revive a similar platform to be
energised with power of incumbency in 2019.
It is therefore, possible that the fear of such
balkanisation may have instigated the grumblings by fringe opposition parties
as to why they were not also considered in the presidential outreach. All these
give the impression that the meeting was merely cosmetic and not programmed to
achieve measurable and durable outcomes.
However, if the President’s meeting with opposition
leaders is a precursor to more of such exchanges, it should be the beginning of
a healing of the charged polity. But if as some sources suggested that it was
inspired by the Abdulsalami Abubakar-led peace committee, a non-partisan body
should moderate future meetings and set the stage for the deepening of the
country’s democracy.
SHOULD President Buhari decide to walk the path of
wide consultation and networking with other leaders, he has some guide in what
his predecessors did and how they were able to hold the country together, while
implementing their blueprints.
Not minding his mercurial style, former President
Obasanjo experimented with the idea of unity government by appointing members
of the opposition political parties into the federal cabinet.
Although some analysts made snide remarks about
that leadership strategy, to the effect that the then president wanted to
obfuscate the massive vote heist that attended his election, rainbow coalition
helped in building patriotism and reducing tension.
In a way, the move also helped to build capacity,
because members of the opposition that got into government had a hands-on in
the art of governance. Moreover it helped the opposition to know, not only that
leading the country was not an easy task, but also that it was at best, a
collective responsibility.
When he mounted the saddle against the background
of general despondency following the twisted nature of the electoral system and
apparent approbation to the erratic notion of might is right, former President
Umaru Musa Yar’Adua also engaged the opposition. Yar’Adua followed up his accommodating
disposition with healthful utterances, such as acquiescing with the popular
belief that the election that brought him to office was greatly flawed.
Thereafter, he proceeded to set up a broad based committee in an honest search
for a review of the electoral system.
Most importantly, President Yar’Adua succeeded in
keeping the country united, not by stating in offhand manner that Nigeria’s
unity was non-negotiable, but by declaring an unflagging obedience to the rule
of law. But for his impaired health that later consumed him, Nigerians still
believe that Yar’Adua came close to an ideal democratic president that they
have always yearned for.
To a great extent, it could be said that the
succeeding administration of President Goodluck Jonathan built on the
foundation laid by Yar’Adua to guarantee fundamental freedoms and enhancing the
democratic experience through improved elections and equal opportunities.
The former President also did much to achieve
national cohesion through presidential communication and personal utterances.
In recognition of the fact that his administration did not attempt to muscle
opposition, President Jonathan stated that not only was he the most abused
President, but that his ambition was not worth the blood of any Nigerian.
News
Source: - The Guardian | September 3, 2017.
Photo Source: - The Guardian | June 18, 2016.
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