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| Buhari and Obasanjo |
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo on Tuesday, in a
blistering and excoriating 13-page statement called on President Muhammadu
Buhari not to seek re-election in 2019.
Mr. Obasanjo, in a special press statement entitled, “The Way
Out: A Clarion Call for Coalition for Nigeria Movement,” said M. Buhari has performed far below expectation and
should honourably “dismount from the horse” to join the league of the country’s
former leaders whose “experience, influence, wisdom and outreach can be
deployed on the side line for the good of the country.”
Mr. Obasanjo, a two-term president on the platform of People
Democratic Party (PDP), said he feels disappointed by Mr. Buhari, whom he
supported during the 2015 election over then incumbent and candidate of his
former party, Goodluck Jonathan.
Mr. Obasanjo had written a condemnatory open letter in
December 2013 titled “Before it is too late” where he highlighted the numerous
failings of the Mr. Jonathan’s administration.
Mr. Obasanjo argued that his decision to go against Mr.
Jonathan, at the time was the right one ‘as events in the last three years have
since proved, was for the good of the nation and nothing personal.
“Even the horse rider then, with whom I maintain very
cordial, happy and social relationship today has come to realise his mistakes
and regretted it publicly and I admire his courage and forthrightness in this
regard,” Mr. Obasanjo said.
“He has a role to play on the side line for the good of
Nigeria, Africa and humanity and I will see him as a partner in playing such a
role nationally and internationally, but not as a horse rider in Nigeria
again.”
Likening the state of the nation to lice-invested clothes,
he said the country’s fingernails is stained with blood as it tries to kill the
lice by pressing them in-between two fingernails. According to him, in other to
make sure that our fingernails remains blood-free we must do what it takes to rid
our clothes of lice.
“The lice of poor performance in government – poverty,
insecurity, poor economic management, nepotism, gross dereliction of duty,
condonation of misdeed – if not outright encouragement of it, lack of progress
and hope for the future, lack of national cohesion and poor management of
internal political dynamics and widening inequality – are very much with us
today,” he wrote.
“With such lice of general and specific poor performance and
crying poverty with us, our fingers will not be dry of ‘blood’,” he added.
While thanking Mr. Buhari for the effort of his
administration in rolling back the Boko Haram insurgency and his fight against
corruption, Mr. Obasanjo said Mr. Buhari has ultimately failed in other areas
where he had thought he would be efficient.
The octogenarian, who bagged a PhD over the weekend,
admitted he knew Mr. Buhari was weak in handling the economy, he went ahead and
voted for him because at the time “it was a matter of ‘any option but Jonathan”
and because he thought Mr. Buhari would appoint qualified Nigerians to help out
in that area.
He slammed Mr. Buhari for turning a blind eye to corruption
within his government saying it amounted to condonation and cover-up saying
whoever is “going to justice must be with clean hands.”
He also berated Mr. Buhari for allowing the clashes between
herdsmen and farmers to go “sour” and messy, saying the endorsement of the
President by some governors to seek re-election barely 24 hours after 73 people
who were killed by herdsmen in Benue State were given mass burial was “a sad
symptom of insensitivity and callousness.”
But Mr. Obasanjo reserved his harshest words for what he
described as Mr. Buhari’s clannishness, lack of understanding of the dynamics
of politics, and his tendencies to pass the buck of his government’s
inadequacies to the immediate past administration.
“But there are three other areas where President Buhari has
come out more glaringly than most of us thought we knew about him. One is nepotic deployment bordering on
clannishness and inability to bring discipline to bear on errant members of his
nepotic court.
This has grave consequences on performance of his government
to the detriment of the nation. It would
appear that national interest was being sacrificed on the altar of nepotic
interest. What does one make of a case
like that of Maina: collusion, condonation, ineptitude, incompetence,
dereliction of responsibility or kinship and friendship on the part of those
who should have taken visible and deterrent disciplinary action?
How many similar cases are buried, ignored or covered up and
not yet in the glare of the media and the public?
“The second is his poor understanding of the dynamics of
internal politics. This has led to
wittingly or unwittingly making the nation more divided and inequality has
widened and become more pronounced. It
also has effect on general national security.
“The third is passing the buck. For instance, blaming the Governor of the
Central Bank for devaluation of the naira by 70 per cent or so and blaming past
governments for it is to say the least, not accepting one’s own
responsibility.
“Let nobody deceive us, economy feeds on politics and
because our politics is depressing, our economy is even more depressing
today. If things were good, President
Buhari would not need to come in. He was
voted to fix things that were bad and not engage in the blame game.”
Buhari and the APC do not have the answer
Mr. Obasanjo thus
argued that neither Mr. Buhari nor his party, the All Progressives Congress
hold the solution to the country’s problems. He suggested that Mr. Buhari was
not healthy enough to withstand the rigour associated with running a country
like Nigeria neither does his party capable of providing the answer needed to
sail the country through its difficulties.
Mr. Obasanjo said Buhari should step down at the end of his
first term with honour and dignity and attend to his health and should not
listen to the his “self-serving so-called advisers who would claim that they
love him more than God loves him and that without him, there would be no
Nigeria say.”
“President Buhari needs a dignified and honourable dismount
from the horse. He needs to have time to reflect, refurbish physically and
recoup and after appropriate rest, once again, join the stock of Nigerian
leaders whose experience, influence, wisdom and outreach can be deployed on the
side line for the good of the country.
“His place in history is already assured. Without impaired health and strain of age,
running the affairs of Nigeria is a 25/7 affair, not 24/7.
“I only appeal to brother Buhari to consider a deserved rest
at this point in time and at this age. I
continue to wish him robust health to enjoy his retirement from active public
service. President Buhari does not
necessarily need to heed my advice. But
whether or not he heeds it, Nigeria needs to move on and move forward,” he
said.
“I have had occasion in the past to say that the two main political
parties – APC and PDP – were wobbling. I
must reiterate that nothing has happened to convince me otherwise. If anything, I am reinforced in my
conviction. The recent show of PDP must
give grave and great concern to lovers of Nigeria.
“To claim, as has been credited to the chief kingmaker of
PDP, that for procuring the Supreme Court judgment for his faction of the
Party, he must dictate the tune all the way and this is indeed fraught with
danger.
“If neither APC nor PDP is a worthy horse to ride to lead
Nigeria at this crucial and critical time, what then do we do? Remember Farooq
Kperogi, an Associate Professor at the Kennesaw State University, Georgia,
United States, calls it “a cruel Hobson’s choice; it’s like a choice between
six and half a dozen, between evil and evil.
“Any selection or deflection would be a distinction without
a difference.” We cannot just sit down
lamenting and wringing our hands desperately and hopelessly.
Coalition of Nigerians
Having ruled out the PDP and the ruling APC of possessing
the panacea to the malaise that ails the country, Mr. Obasanjo therefore called
for a movement he termed Coalition of Nigeria, which he offered to be a part
of, to wrest power from the present ruling class and lead the country into the
path of rebirth.
“We can collectively save ourselves from the position we
find ourselves. It will not come through
self-pity, fruitless complaint or protest but through constructive and positive
engagement and collective action for the good of our nation and ourselves and
our children and their children.
“We need moral re-armament and engaging togetherness of
people of like-mind and goodwill to come solidly together to lift Nigeria
up. This is no time for trading blames
or embarking on futile argument and neither should we accept untenable excuses
for non-performance.
“Let us accept that the present administration has done what
it can do to the limit of its ability, aptitude and understanding. Let the
administration and its political party platform agree with the rest of us that
what they have done and what they are capable of doing is not good enough for
us. They have given as best as they have
and as best as they can give.
“Nigeria deserves and urgently needs better than what they
have given or what we know they are capable of giving. To ask them to give more will be unrealistic
and will only sentence Nigeria to a prison term of four years if not destroy it
beyond the possibility of an early recovery and substantial growth.
“The development and modernization of our country and
society must be anchored and sustained on dynamic Nigerian culture, enduring
values and an enchanting Nigerian dream.
We must have abiding faith in our country and its role and place within
the comity of nations. Today, Nigeria
needs all hands on deck. All hands of
men and women of goodwill must be on deck.
We need all hands to move our country forward.
“We need a Coalition for Nigeria, CN. Such a Movement at
this juncture needs not be a political party but one to which all well-meaning Nigerians
can belong. That Movement must be a
coalition for democracy, good governance, social and economic well-being and
progress. Coalition to salvage and
redeem our country.
“You can count me with such a Movement. Last time, we asked, prayed and worked for
change and God granted our request. This
time, we must ask, pray and work for change with unity, security and progress.
And God will again grant us.
“Of course, nothing should stop such a Movement from
satisfying conditions for fielding candidates for elections. But if at any
stage the Movement wishes to metamorphose into candidate-sponsoring Movement
for elections, I will bow out of the Movement because I will continue to
maintain my non-partisan position.
Coalition for Nigeria must have its headquarters in Abuja.
“This Coalition for Nigeria will be a Movement that will
drive Nigeria up and forward. It must
have a pride of place for all Nigerians, particularly for our youth and our
women. It is a coalition of hope for all Nigerians for speedy, quality and
equal development, security, unity, prosperity and progress. It is a coalition to banish poverty,
insecurity and despair.
“Our country must not be oblivious to concomitant danger
around, outside and ahead. Coalition for
Nigeria must be a Movement to break new ground in building a united country, a
socially-cohesive and moderately prosperous society with equity, equality of
opportunity, justice and a dynamic and progressive economy that is self-reliant
and takes active part in global division of labour and international
decision-making.
“The Movement must work out the path of development and the
trajectory of development in speed, quality and equality in the short- medium-
and long-term for Nigeria on the basis of sustainability, stability, predictability,
credibility, security, cooperation and prosperity with diminishing
inequality.
~Premium Times
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