Is Obasanjo The Real Problem?
By
Akin Falegan
On a daily basis it get more and more interesting to follow the development in Nigeria politics. All the hullabaloos about impeaching Obasanjo or making sure that he is not re-elected is very interesting to watch. In all these shouting and hollering, vast majority are underestimating the wittiness of Obasanjo.
Frankly speaking, I suspect that President Obasanjo is not perturbed by the happenings around or about him. This man does not really care whether he wins or loses the election. Be rest assured he will fight the impeachment process and succeed at humiliating the house, because nothing is really honorable about the house members.
President Obasanjo is in a win-win situation. It does not really matter whichever way it flips Obasanjo will still come out a winner. Why? The man has made up his mind that wining the election is not a do or die situation with him, if he should lose the election he will end up been the first civilian ruler of Nigeria that loses election and hand over power to his successor without any itch.
In the light of the above, it is very important to re-examine the stage Nigeria is entering in her political life. Are we pawns or real players in this game of politics? It is very dishearten that Nigerians are still suffering from chronic disillusionment and serious inferiority complex, Nigerians have been so abused psychologically by the military boys to the extent that we now only look up to ex-military boys to rescue the nation from the mess they created in the first place. When are we going to learn? Nothing really good can come out of recycling of these ex-military boys they simply don’t have anything good to offer.
Nigeria need and deserve the best brains available in the country to be saddled with the responsibility of re-inventing the nation to enhance progress and prosperity. Nigeria is naturally endowed and blessed of God with the wherewithal to be a great nation, but nothing short of irresponsibility galore by the ruling class has devastated the supposed to be great nation.
Can this folly be more demonstrated any other way worst than the impeachment joke the nation is subjected to by the hand of the so called honorable house of representatives members. Nigerian politician are so blind and out of tune with the honorable culture of service and responsibility to the extent that some are now considered as professional politicians. It is absurd to consider public service as a profession. All they know to do is to grab and grab, from the local government all the way to Aso Rock. The mentality and even the expectation of a great percentage of the masses is that any involvement in public office is to loot the treasury. The Nigeria war of 1984 to 1999 prosecuted by Buhari, Babangida, Abacha and Abdulsalami regimes, has a resonating effect in the political mentality of Nigerians today, these men of no virtue are still players in Nigeria political life, what do we expect of these men that we have not seen. Nothing good has ever emanated from any of them, and nothing good ever will. Both Babangida and Buhari are considered to be possible presidential hopeful, even Buhari has made his intention known. It is very repugnant that these men have no shame and some charlatans in the political class of so called elites are backing them up to further ruin the prospect of greatness for the nation.
Regardless of the fact that I am appalled at the abysmal failure of Obasanjo’s administration, in this writer’s opinion we all are trying to ignore the obvious, which is more damaging that whatever any federal government can do, especially in a democratic Nigeria. What am I trying to allude to? Simply the other tiers of the government namely the state and local government; let everyone of us evaluate the performance or lack of such in our individual local governments and state governments.
Lets take for example, Ekiti my home state:
In the last three years the government of Mr. Niyi Adebayo’s has spent over N50 Billion, with nothing tangible to show for it. Within the said period of time Ekiti State government received N21 billion from the Federation Account. Ekiti state government under Niyi Adebayo has taken loan of N22.2 billion from several avenues for projects that were never completed or shoddy job done. Honest analysis of the corruption and misappropriation of funds that has taken place in Ekiti state, per ratio of money available Ekiti State government is way more corrupt than the federal government. And I am very sure the same is true to most state governments in this dispensation. If people can scrutinize the state and local governments in their areas and be vocal in their criticism Nigeria will be the better for it. But, most people will rather lob their criticism over the state and local governments to reach the federal. “ Charity begins at home”. Let’s focus on what is happening in our backyards to help better the lot of our people. In my own opinion most of the present state governors do not deserve to be re-elected, what have they to show for the last three years? Absolutely nothing of substance commensurates with the money spent.
Let’s awake out of slumber, focus on and zero in on the performance of the local governments and the state governments in our areas and at the same time be not ignorant of what the federal government is up to. Even if we have a good federal government and the other tiers of government are corrupt, the people will still suffer. We can draw from history of Nigeria, while the federal government of Nigeria in pre-independence (self government) and 1st republic was like a rudderless ship in the mist of high sea, the government in western region excelled. The state and local governments can do more to better the life of the citizenry easily than the federal government.
I submit that it is time to examine the local and the state governments the way we scrutinized the federal government, the 50 billion plus that Mr. Niyi Adebayo of Ekiti state squandered was not wasted by the federal government, must we blame Obasanjo for Adebayo’s ineptness.
Akin Falegan
Atlanta.