There is an old saying, “When two elephants fight, the grass suffers.” But when the elephants involved in the fight are three or more, the grass certainly gets messier. This is what we’re seeing, or about to witness, in the ancient city of Kano. As it is, the city has two emirs, or two former emirs, so to speak: Muhammadu Sanusi 2 and Aminu Ado Bayero.
Let’s give the story some perspective. Firstly, Muhammadu Sanusi 2, was known as Sanusi Lamido Sanusi. Before his installation as emir in 2014, he was Nigeria’s Central Bank governor. Even in that position, he was suspended for saying things President Goodluck Jonathan didn’t like. And as emir of Kano, he was deposed by governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje in 2020 for “his utterances”, one of which was that Nigerians should take up arms to defend themselves in the face of the government’s failure to protect them. He was replaced by Aminu Ado Bayero, the son of the late Ado Bayero, who reigned as emir before Sanusi. [Ganduje is the present chairman of the All People’s Congress]
Fast track to May 22 2024. The new New Nigeria People’s Party [ NNPP ] that defeated the APC in the 2023 governorship election changed the law that led to Sanusi’s removal from office and his replacement by Aminu, believed to be his cousin. The new legislation also abolished the four other emirates Ganduje created and restored the old Kano emirate. The new governor removed Aminu and restored Sanusi, this time as the 16th Emir of Kano. All that happened while Aminu was out of Kano, visiting the Oba of Ijesha land in Osun state and President Bola Tinubu in Abuja. When he got to know of his dethronement, Aminu rushed back to Kano and quickly got the federal high court in the city to declare him the legitimate emir. At the same time, the state high court said he had been removed and then replaced by Sanusi. Nigeria’s Chief Justice Olukayode Ariwoola didn’t find this development funny at all. Two courts giving contradictory decisions in the same case! The federal court’s ruling, the police’s reluctance to get Aminu out of the emir’s palace and the fact that Aminu received royal greeting from President Tinubu when the former visited the Presidential Villa in Abuja lent weight to speculations that the Federal Government supported Aminu to stay on as emir. If true, it would be unlike what happened in 2020 when President Muhammadu Buhari resisted pressure on him to intervene to stop the deposition of Sanusi, saying it wasn’t a federal case.
Meanwhile, the Kano state government has given Sanusi an official letter, reappointing him as Kano’s emir but Aminu is holding on to the sceptre, the symbol of authority. This anomie, or uncertainty as to who, between Aminu and Sanusi, holds the traditional seat of power, has led their supporters to bring out the long knives. Kano, literally, is on the boil; protests are taking place on the streets in support of or against either claimant of the throne. In this whirlwind of protests, Sanusi has been justifying his return as an act of God. “Whoever believes that Allah alone gives everything must take the decision of Allah wholeheartedly,” he told worshippers during Thursday’s prayers. “No one asks Allah’s reasons for anything. We were told that whoever did not accept destiny is from Allah, his belief isn’t complete. One should be thankful in times of good and bad situations. We must believe that whatever happens to us is predestined from God and what we couldn’t have is from Him.”
Clearly, Aminu, though himself a practicing Muslim, does not accept his removal as an “act of Allah.” Sanusi was also philosophical about his dethronement, attributing it to Allah’s will. However, God is not God of contrariness. He cannot say or do something now and the next moment undo it or take it back. As James, a first century “servant of God”, said, God, ” the Father of heavenly lights … does not change like shifting shadows.” Sanusi’s initial humility before Allah appears to have weathered under a compelling personal craving for power. But to dignify personal ambition with God’s name is going too far.
Ganduje’s removal of Sanusi, just as the colonialists did his grandfather in 1956, showed some degree of courageous grit. But he made a mistake in banning the former emir from Kano but allowing him to roam the rest of the country and to talk as he liked. Sanusi was able to reconstruct his public image as “emir of the people.” Take the late Col. Yohanna Madaki, the military governor of old Gongola State. He removed the emir of Muri and exiled him to Mubi where he remained until his death. Ganduje also wasn’t mindful of the lesson of the late Abubakar Rimi’s disastrous treatment of emir Ado Bayero in the 80s. Kano people love and respect their monarch. Rimi first queried the emir for leaving his domain without seeking and getting his government’s approval. Then he suspended him. Kano erupted in anti government riots that led to loss of lives and destruction public property and private houses. The two elephants that the political establishment in Kano has created may fight dirty and leave the grass, the residents of Kano – bruised to the marrow. Worse, the reputation of the once very well respected traditional rulership in Kano may have been damaged beyond repair.
