The Unwarranted Search For An All-Inclusive Government By The New Nigerian President

Dr Abayomi Ferreira

Wanting to legitimise the Nigerian election

Exactly as we predicted, the ruling cliques have rigged the Nigerian elections of 2007 and the Peoples’ Democratic Party PDP has won power overwhelmingly by repeating the fraudulent electoral process that have been the unfortunate lot of Nigerians since 1951. The fraud, as always, has been so pervading that their usual international backers, also as always have publicly condemned the dishonesty in the process that has returned the PDP and its new flag bearer, Musa Yar’Adua to government in Nigeria. The process and contents of the conduct of the elections are roundly and completely condemned all over the world. Indeed, there are serious considerations presently ongoing in the West to keep the chief perpetrator of the latest national fraud away from the very international groups that had hailed Obasanjo, as an example that a democrat should be in Africa. In July 2005, at Gleneagles Scotland, the G8 summit of the Western Powers presided over by Tony Blair made promises of development grants to be made to the neo-colonial countries in Africa. Those promises have remained largely ignored and unfulfilled. Tony Blair created the Africa Progress Panel in June 2006 to gauge performances in Africa’s neo colonial states. This panel is now set to deny Obasanjo membership of the group. The members of the panel include Kofi Annan, the erstwhile Secretary-General of the United Nations, Bob Geldof, the music-based international campaigner for Western grants mainly from the G8 for grants to African countries. G8 leaders annually present themselves as do-gooders and lovers of the exploited peoples of the world with Bob Geldof and Bono the rock music star, essentially musicians being always available to add fuel to the blazing fire of deception. Indeed, Bob Geldof is terribly disappointed at the Western promises without delivery. The Western leaders refuse to accept the fact that they merely make promises to, give back a small fraction of what the West has taken from the poor countries. Firstly, the World Bank promoted massive devaluation of the national currencies of the African countries to perpetually deprive the peoples of those countries of their rightful returns from their products that are sold to the developed world whilst simultaneously they pay excessively for finished products from the developed world. In the past quarter of a century, the naira has been devalued by 4700 per cent thereby infinitely multiplying over and over again the poverty of the peoples of Nigeria. Simultaneously, the quality of living of the people of the Western world continues to improve. Even if all the promised grants and aids are fulfilled, the deprivation imposed by devaluation of national currencies can never be atoned for. At the 2007 G8 summit, 30 million pounds have been promised to fight HIV Aids and malaria in Africa. There is no commitment to any delivery date or implementation of the promise. That hollow promise happened also in 2005 and to a large extent remains unfulfilled. Secondly, annually, trillions of dollars are manipulated jointly by the imperialist economies and the ruling political cliques of Nigeria and other African countries from the poor African economies into the Western countries. Obasanjo initially gained his reputation in the West when he, unlike most of his likes among the numerous dictators in contemporary African affairs handed over power to an ‘elected’ government in Nigeria in 1979. Although, Obasanjo in 1979, Obasanjo wilfully manipulated the process of electing Shehu Shagari and the National Party of Nigeria NPN into power by removing the Chief Justice of Nigeria and replacing him with Justice Fatayi Williams who was to, and indeed did make ‘momentous decisions’ to prevent ‘the best candidate’ from becoming the elected President of Nigeria. The West yet overlooked the momentous manipulation that ensured that the neo colonial structure and state of Nigeria remained immersed within the grips of Western imperialism. In 2007, Obasanjo has completed the roles assigned to him by the West and he deserves to be dumped by the West into the decadent garbage of history where he truly belongs. Strictly considered, African countries should by now, having celebrated with Ghana in March half a century of independence, stop going around for aids and grants to develop their countries. There are enough resources to kick off the process of growth and development. Appropriate intellectual application within the context of political commitment and good economic programmes will take the continent out of the present sustained state of poverty and backwardness. There has been no country in history that has been developed by foreigners.

But there was An electoral contest of a sort

It is within the context of the inability to satisfy even the standards and expectations of their imperialist masters that we want to discuss the attempt by Musa Yar’Adua to clothe the power his party has fraudulently acquired with some degree of legitimacy by foisting an all-inclusive government on Nigerians. The Nigerian polity, like all the other neo colonial states in Africa, functions within the context of Western economic, security and political interests. The correct picture of failure to develop can only be seen through the milieu of these anti-development linkages with the West. If the Nigerian peoples had wanted an all-inclusive government, then there would have been no necessity to put the country through the waste of inter-party contests after a prolonged election campaign that cost the country billions of naira, massive distraction from public discourse of the issues of development, maiming and killing of innocent people and various crimes that were committed by politicians who gave all their venom to gain access to the national resources and treasury for personal conversion. A properly designed electoral process implies that the people were presented with differing programmes for development by the contesting political parties to enable the people pick the preferred programme of the winning party. Even in a situation where there were no programmes offered to the electorate as was the case at the 2007 Nigerian elections, the ground still stands that there are winners and there are losers. The losers have no mandate to go into any government and be a part of the mess and failure that is expected of the PDP government. For example, the Action Congress AC is in one breadth described in the press as an opposition party and in the next breadth its leaders are seeking to be ministers in the government of the PDP.

Indeed, the concrete truth is that the so-called different parties of the establishment politicians is a ruse to give a semblance of democratic rivalry in a situation where there is actually nothing to choose between the parties and the politicians that dominate the political terrain in Nigeria. The Action Congress AC, (a.k.a Alliance for Democracy AD), Peoples’ Democratic Party PDP, All Nigeria Peoples’ Party ANPP, All Progressive Grand Alliance APGA, African Democratic Congress ADC and the numerous breakaway parties are one and the same movement. The politicians who use these platforms move readily and regularly from one party to the other. The driving force for each of the politicians in these parties is a certain and assured access to the national resources of the country no matter on which platform. They cross carpets both singly and corporately. The newly concluded 2007 elections is riddled with numerous examples of carpet crossings that are not attributable to any divergence or differences in policies, programmes or philosophy. This absurd quality is the real reason for apparent political rivals wanting to be in the same government after the elections.

The real opposition parties

The authentic opposition is made of persons who genuinely desire and wish to work for the rapid economic development of Nigeria. Such patriots are found in the Democratic Alternative DA, Peoples’ Redemption Party PRP, and National Conscience Party NCP. They are weak today as apolitical force because

· INEC is inherently incapable of a proper regulation of political practice as is provided for in the 1999 Constitution that is in force.

· The need for the patriots to build a truly mass movement for the take over of political power in Nigeria

· There are 33 million Nigerians who by their refusal to vote in the 2007 elections, as in the 1999 and 2003 elections are consistent in their silent expression of distrust in the Nigerian electoral process. These indeed constitute the majority of the electorate as depicted on the register of voters.

· These 33 million conscious voters are yet to be organised into the mass movement for the displacement of looters from the dominant control of the Nigerian polity.

The genuine political opposition to the present ruling clique will have to pursue as a part of their programme

1. The promotion and campaign for a new constitution on the template of the Draft Constitution that was recently adopted at the 2006 Sovereign National Conference that was promoted by PRONACO. This draft constitution needs to be campaigned among the people and its implications for national development explained. It is a much superior document to the current military constitution that is being used by self-seeking politicians to stay in power and loot the national treasury at will.

2. Full employment that is a sine qua non for the simultaneous extrication of deprived 112 million Nigerians who are trapped in families that exist on less than five thousand naira per annum and the rapid economic development of Nigeria.

3. Revaluation of the naira to the pre-devaluation exchange rate that is an absolute necessity to reverse the imposition of perpetual poverty on our people by the International Monetary Fund IMF and the World Bank. This one step will render unnecessary the annual do-goody rituals of the G8 countries and the patronising campaigns in Europe and America for a so-called just wages to the farmers of African countries who are producers of the raw materials, coffee, cocoa, that are processed in Western factories into finished products which their own people access very cheaply.

Musa Yar’Adua and the PDP government will never promote such a programme of political and economic development. The political elements in the AC, ADC, ANPP, APGA, AD and other such parties who are angling for posts in the new government will equally never promote such a programme.

Musa Yar’Adua should form a proper PDP government

Our very strong advice to Musa Yar’Adua is that he should form his government from the PDP even though the party has no real programme for the development of Nigeria. In any case, the parties whose politicians are jostling to hold jobs in the new government equally have no real programme for the development of Nigerian. We may at this point put the question, “What was the good results Nigerians got from Bola Ige of the Action for Democracy AD serving in Obasanjo’s PDP government?” The answer is,” None”

When President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua returns from the present showcase in which he is paraded along with Tom Mbeki, John Kuffour and some two other African presidents by the G8 governments at Heiligendamm, Rostock in Germany, he should constitute a thorough executive council of the PDP and ignore office seekers who actually do not believe in the PDP, fought against the PDP at the recent elections, but are hypocritical enough to want to be a part of the PDP government machinery.

The genuine opposition contained in the Democratic Alternative DA, Peoples’ Redemption Party PRP and National Conscience Party NCP should mobilise the silent 35 million voters who have silently expressed and repeatedly, at three consecutive elections in 1999, 2003 and 2007, their absolute distrust in the existing Nigerian polity and its dominance by self-seeking politicians into a mass movement for the take over of power in Nigeria. There is hope for a radical change for the development of our country. The authentic struggle must continue.

Dr Abayomi Ferreira

9 June 2007

www.abayomiferreira.com