Anyone who expected the period of transition to new administrations in the country on May 29 to be tranquil has got another thing coming. Far from being a period of rest, introspection and forward planning after the tumultuous campaign and election period, the drama has now shifted to press conferences, radio and television interviews, Eze’s palaces, street demonstrations, leaked audio tapes of a religious war and even in aircraft cabins. And that is before the courts move in.
Many of the things that are happening today, had a precedent in contemporary Nigerian history. Salvoes are coming not only from the election losers, but from election winners as well. Kano State Governor-elect Abba Kabir Yusuf, popularly known as Gida Gida, fired a “public advisory” last week “to all individuals, groups and other organisations that have ongoing construction in public places. You are advised to discontinue any construction work on public land” within and around schools, religious and cultural sites, hospitals, graveyards and along the city walls of Kano. A day later, Gida Gida warned any bank that lends money to the state government between now and May 29 that he will not repay it.
Governor Ganduje quickly responded and said Gida Gida should “desist from making official pronouncements in order to avoid confusion.” He said “The action of the governor-elect amounts to jumping the gun” and that Ganduje “remains the governor with executive powers until May 29 and reserves the right to carry out his functions in public interest, even on the eve of his exit.” He also said some of the plots were allocated by the Kwankwaso administration in which Abba Yusuf was Housing Commissioner.
This exchange reminds me of two episodes. In September 1979, when schools reopened for a new session, Lagos State Governor-elect Lateef Jakande, still three weeks away from his swearing-in, issued a statement saying principals of government-owned schools should not collect school fees from students in line with the incoming UPN government’s free education program. The Military Administrator, Ebitu Ukiwe, immediately warned LKJ to keep off, since he was not yet the governor. LKJ then slightly backtracked and said principals should keep proper records of the fees they collected because they will be made to refund them.
More sedate on this score was Olusegun Obasanjo. In April 1999 when he was President-elect, a reporter asked him a question about a certain issue of governance. Obasanjo replied that he will not comment on it since there was a [military] government in place and that in Africa, “there cannot be two chiefs in one village.” Never mind that Obasanjo did not always live by that wisdom.
Another interesting episode from Kano last week was a pledge by the Governor-elect’s godfather, Rabi’u Kwankwaso, that he will not interfere in his son-in-law’s incoming administration. He will only offer advice if he is asked, Kwankwaso said. Insofar as Gida Gida rode to the governorship almost entirely on Kwankwaso’s political wings, this promise will be hard to keep. It however reminds me of a story that the late Kebbi politician Alhaji Garba Dandiga once told me. I apologise in advance to Oga Bukola Saraki for not telling him this story earlier. Dandiga said in late 2003, he and some colleagues were in Ilorin to attend Dr. Olusola Saraki’s turbanning as Waziri of Ilorin while his son, Governor Bukola Saraki, succeeded him as Turaki of Ilorin. He said one Kebbi politician approached Saraki and said, “Oloye, we are very happy for you! You have been anointing governors in this Kwara State and they have been betraying you! Now Allah has helped you and your son is the governor!”
He said Baba Saraki stole a glance at Governor Bukola, who sat a few meters away. When he saw that Bukola was not listening, he whispered, “All those ones you said, are better than this one! When I gave them list of commissioners, they took half but this one, he didn’t take any. And I cannot talk because people will say this old man is troublesome, he is fighting his own son!”
Zamfara State Governor Bello Mutawalle also raised dust last week. He said that he lost his re-election bid to PDP’s Dauda Lawal Dare because the federal government sent 300 truckloads of soldiers to ensure that he lost in order to punish him for challenging its new naira policy in court. Mutawalle and two other APC governors first filed the suit at the Supreme Court to challenge the policy, though many other state governments later joined the suit. According to the governor, 50 soldiers were sent to each strategic polling unit to intimidate voters against voting for APC. He said “They (soldiers) were even straight about it, that those voting for APC would not be allowed to vote.”
In this election cycle, even PDP and LP restricted themselves to accusing INEC of alleged misdeeds but Mutawalle directly accused the Presidency of using soldiers to rig elections against him. Assuming the Presidency has 50 soldiers to post to every polling unit in Zamfara [which adds up to more than the total number of soldiers in the Nigerian Army], how feasible was it to instruct soldiers to isolate APC voters and drive them away from the polling booths? And why didn’t the Presidency do the same in Kaduna, which has a whole Army Division, an Airforce base and several elite military academies in residence, and whose governor went much further than Mutawalle in opposing the cashless policy?
Then there was LP presidential running mate Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed’s sensational interview, which has even attracted a N5million fine that National Broadcasting Commission slapped on Channels TV. He said democracy will end in Nigeria on May 29 if Bola Ahmed Tinubu is sworn-in as President because he did not satisfy the legal requirements for election. Datti’s main contention was that Tinubu did not win a quarter of the votes in Abuja. But senior lawyer Kayode Ajulo said the Supreme Court ruled twenty years ago that FCT is like any other state for this purpose. Which makes sense; are we saying that FCT residents are superior to other Nigerians and can veto a man’s election victory even if he wins a quarter of the votes in all 36 states? Datti warned the Chief Justice of Nigeria not to swear in Tinubu. Pray, what is CJN’s own in this matter as long as a man brings a valid certificate of return?
Throughout the period of the Second Republic, the late Tai Solarin, in his column in Nigerian Tribune, kept referring to President Shehu Shagari’s mandate as “the stolen presidency,” a term borrowed from a 19th century American episode. Hot on the heels of Datti’s claim, some people organized a march to Defence Headquarters in Abuja. Although they only called for the election’s cancellation, the thinly veiled message was for the military to intervene and seize power. After 24 years in the barracks, Nigerian soldiers may no longer be that power hungry. The late Marafan Sokoto Alhaji Umaru Shinkafi once told me a story. That on October 1, 1979, as General Obasanjo was dressing to go to the parade ground and hand over power to civilians, some of the Head of State’s orderlies stood in the doorway and repeatedly said, “Dis your handover sef!”
Then there was this man who erupted in a scheduled Abuja to Lagos Ibom Air flight last Friday, saying he was an LP supporter and shouting that Tinubu should not be sworn-in as President. One bad practice begets another. In September 1993, during Chief Ernest Shonekan’s Interim Government, three men hijacked a Nigeria Airways plane to Niger Republic. Those ones wanted Chief MKO Abiola to be sworn-in as President; Mr. Obiajulu Uja is saying Tinubu must not be sworn in. Whether we want someone to be sworn-in or not to be sworn-in, must we hijack planes and endanger passengers’ lives? Where did the Constitution say that swearing-in can be stopped because someone shouted obscenities in a plane?
Mr. Uja’s lawyer now says that his client, who will be arraigned in court today, is of unsound mind, had earlier been thrown out of an Abuja hotel and had bought three different air tickets for the same trip to Lagos. Maybe the lawyer is trying to save his client from a sticky situation because unruly behaviour in a plane these days, post 911 and post shoe bomber, could count as terrorism.
Nor is there a lot of peace in the political parties with the [temporary] removal of Dr. Iorchia Ayu as PDP chairman and suspension of NDDC chairperson Lauretta Onochie by her APC ward, both for alleged anti-party activities, and the sudden resignation of NNPP national chairman Prof Rufa’i Alkali, who said he wanted someone else to have a go at restructuring the party. Then there is Eze Igbo of Ajao Estate, Lagos, Fredrick Nwajagu, now cooling his heels in DSS cells for threatening to invite IPOB militants to Lagos in order to protect Igbo lives and property from attacks.
Of all the drama of last week however, possibly the most damaging was the audio leak in which LP presidential candidate Peter Obi told General Overseer of Living Faith Church David Oyedepo that the 2023 election is a religious war and he should wade in with a message. LP spokesman Kenneth Okonkwo said the audio is authentic but was taken out of context. Ok, tell us the real context of using the phrase religious war.
