I begin today›s discourse with a confession. I had already done a work titled, «One country, two leaders,» in which I asserted that our country has two leaders: the one we elected, which is President Bola Tinubu and the other is the military institution. The crux of the analysis was about military/civilian relationships. I felt it would tally with the mood of the week, coming at a time the country would be wasting time and funds to celebrate another Democracy Day.
Apart from mass participation of citizens in the governance process and change of leadership personnel via a non-violent format, the other thing very crucial without which a system can›t be said to be democratic is civil (human) rights. Its place is so cardinal that the founding fathers of America, our example of democracy, felt it deserved not only special attention but special placement in that country›s constitution. In fact human and civic rights are, the backbone of that democracy and the world has come to accept it as such.
Anybody very familiar with our political development, you can correctly guess what our leaders, starting from the President to the governors and the other players would say concerning democracy and its practice in our country. Following that trend it wasn›t difficult to know that would hear them say that on democracy we stand. It was also certain we would be told democracy has yielded the country so many dividends.
On Wednesday, June 12, every expectation came through exactly. The President, governors and other very high public office holders didn›t fail those conversant with our system. They paid great tribute to virtues of this unique system of government.
For me and many others what was staged amounted to a charade, a clear «absurd pretense intended to create a pleasant or respectable appearance» for Nigerians. What played out were just acts intended to take away from reality and to establish what is not, in order to further push a narrow interest.
We begin from the narrow until we enter the broad spectrum. It is true the people have been led to subscribe to democracy (there was never a referendum or conference to make a choice). That point is established, the next issue would be this: can we be truthful and answer if what we are practicing since we got Independence is near the concept called democracy?
The plain truth is that we are not practicing democracy at all. President Tinubu alluded to this in his address when he admitted the concept is no rocket science or an abstract. That admittance raised the question: if it is not so opaque why is it that it has appeared such a very difficult process to operate in our country since independence in 1960? This is the big question everyone ought to be asking and truly the question that should have preoccupied the minds of all citizens on occasions such as Democracy Day.
In spite of very deep knowledge of the concept by our founding fathers minus the National Council for Nigeria and the Cameroon (NCNC), spearheaded by Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, an Igbo, the rest of the political parties that sprang up before independence were mainly tribal organizations. They drew their vision from primordial factors, especially ethnicity and religion, with no grand national vision. It was no surprise regions did very well to the obvious detriment of the bigger whole; it is therefore easily predictable that something will cave in and when it happened with the first coup, for many enlightened minds, it was no surprise at all.
It is only a fool or a mad man who will be pulling in different directions and never expect a tear. The effect of the collapse of the first initial steps have dogged our steps at national development from then till the present. It has not loosened its grip on us, rather it has dug very deep.
Given world configuration, the place of imperialism and veiled war among nations and races, if we were bright people we ought to know a point will come when the military institution will intervene and interrupt the civil leadership process. Their coming ought not to be the worry but whether they would carry enough vision and patriotism to understand what to do with power. This was the main challenge but none saw through it this way because the country wasn’t founded on any grand vision.
It has been revealed that in our case military intervention wasn›t at the behest of imperialist forces, neither was it as a result of natural convulsion. The intervention was the product of instigated by civilian political actors, who had no ideological foundation. They went for what they would gain and to a large extent for advancement of narrow group interest. The dislocation of the country has its roots here. It was not the civil leaders that abrogated federalism, rather it was the military. They also redrew the political administrative structure that was generally agreed to and replaced it with what suited their individual whims and caprices.
How can anyone imagine that Lagos State with a higher population than Kano State has only 20 local governments while Kano has 44 LGAs that are supposed to be a different tier of government with fund allocations from the Federation Account. Old Sokoto State has produced two additional states while Lagos and Cross River have remained the same. So much to say about the envisaged new Nigeria. We leave it there and take the President›s Democracy Day speech as working document.
Tinubu came through as great for recognizing past heroes in very specific terms, a nation ought to have heroes. Never mind his list was full of people from his immediate area. At least he has started something good. He spoke glowingly about democracy. It was instructive when he let it be known that a country can be doing elections but not be a democracy but every true democracy he emphasized must organize elections.
We have become experts in dodging real issues and liking to dwell on the periphery of matters, no matter their seriousness, President Tinubu didn›t fail on this score. His generalized speech artfully avoided talking about massive citizens participation in the electoral process nor did anyone hear anything about credible electoral process and sanctity of the ballot box. He gave the impression everything on those scores were running very well. Is that the true reflection? If it isn›t, the question would be, can we build the kind of country the world is expecting from us on a foundation of deceit?
Lawyers say anything built on nothing will fall. Isn›t this our testimony? Every poll we have had in this country was highly contested. Those who will say it is a learning process have Kenya, Ghana, Botswana, Namibia, Senegal and South Africa to look to. Our march to pure development has been hindered in most parts by the quality of leadership personnel available and what has been responsible is the very faulty leadership recruitment process that is in place.
Then you have the other former governor who boldly told Nigerians that he was solely responsible for producing the governor and members of the House of Assembly of his state. He isn›t alone in this act of subverting duly approved electoral procedure.
It is a general trend. Things aren›t better with formation of political parties. Those in existence are property of very few individuals. It is not on equal joiners and equal stakeholders basis, yet we clap and cheer that we have got a democracy. One doesn›t want to mention how votes are awarded to candidates after the sham that pass for elections.
Unity and sense of national bonding have waned considerably and this is very true except for those who don›t wish the country well. We ought to renegotiate the basis for the unity of the country but a group that benefited from acts of brigandage against the country insist that won›t happen. President Muhammadu Buhari gave closed eyed to the question of national unity. Tinubu who succeeded him is toeing same line. He hasn›t spoken to any group, definitely doesn›t know the inner workings yet he believes by a stroke of luck things can fall into order.
Patriotism is not a product bought in the market, it is not wished into existence, same for the making of a nation where all would be happy. These are products of skilful and deliberate hardwork. Tinubu agreed that democracy recognizes divergences in opinions and needs and said solutions should be extracted by force or might. The northern establishment who control agencies of coercion have lately been running on this paradigm without success and unfortunately. Tinubu has adopted the same formula. Imagine for once if in his address he had announced the release of Nnamdi Kanu. He has not engaged any group and one year is gone of his tenure.
Democracy goes with human rights and dignity for citizens. Recently, the military establishment is pushing itself rather too far. The level of impunity coming from the sector is becoming too high for comfort. No citizen has a right to wilfully attack and kill them but when a few demented ones in our midst get out to do the untoward, the method of reaction should not be anything near a declaration of war, creating a seige and turning guns on citizens on a general note. The approach should be professional with the country directing her intelligence units to get in and fish out these enemies of state and national growth for the law to take its due course.
Our economic foundation wasn›t laid on a faulty foundation as the president alluded to, it was a wise decision to run the country on a welfare system, where the government led the way and private initiative followed. Suddenly,3 the world of imperialism broke through the ranks of our leaders and introduced the wacky idea that everything must be about «private initiative», call it crude capitalism and that «government has no right being in business.» This is the root of the destruction of the economy and stifling of economic progress.
Increasingly, foreign forces got their local allies and collaborators to systematically begin to destroy our economic foundations. They began to destroy schools, health centres, infrastructure, energy supply and made farming uninteresting. British Airways was government owned until a few years ago and by then its operations had stabilized. Even today no government any where can harass them without the British government stepping in. Let›s not go very far, Ethiopian government in Africa runs one of the best airline corporations in the world today.
In terms of welfare relations abroad have said just with a token abroad as health insurance one can get any level of treatment. I saw a Nigerian who said he had a domestic cut at home and everyone who saw it insisted he must go to hospital. He said he was ferried from home by an ambulance and given a king›s treatment. He said that at the hospital, it was like the doctors had seen the president of the country with just a knife cut on the fingers. He was treated, given food and money for wounding himself. He said he couldn›t believe what he was seeing. His young children are re paid living allowances by the state.
Truth is we love sounding very high on platitudes but totally lacking on action. Our leaders talk of democracy but rig the elections. They talk about unity but fan embers of ethnicity and religion. How on earth would a country borrowing money release unbudgeted 90 billion naira for religious pilgrimage? How can the Senate of a country in dire economic straits be engaged in talking about cattle colony? It is time we decide if truly we want Nigeria to be, else all that our leaders avoid would be downloaded to us free of charge, very easily by Mother nature. One needs to tell another we are currently running in the shadows of fascism.