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PEOPLE AND POLITICS BY MOHAMMED HARUNA Agwai’s and Anenih’s Warnings to Politicians
Early last month, the Chief of Army Staff (CAS), Lt-General Martin-Luther Agwai, issued a stern warning to politicians to desist from activities he said were capable of truncating our nascent democracy and even destroying the country.
For good measure Agwai further said “We on our part will continue to allow professional politicians to do their job… I want to also assure Nigerians that the Nigerian army will continue to perform its constitutional role of nurturing our democracy to maturity because I believe democracy is the best form of governance.”
The army chief spoke against the background of recent violent political clashes in various parts of the country and the tug-of-war over so-called power rotation between the North and South. The occasion itself was a ceremony in Bauchi at which he was given a peace award by an organization, the Peace Mission of Nigeria. The award, said PMN, was in recognition of the army chief’s contribution to peace and security not only in Nigeria, but in Africa at large.
As if to reinforce Agwai’s worry about the unity and stability of the country, President Obasanjo’s own Man Friday, Chief Tony Anenih, weighed in with his own warning against those whom he said seemed hell-bent on destroying the country in pursuit of their political ambitions. Anenih’s warning was on the occasion of his conferment, over the weekend, with a honourary doctorate in agriculture by the University of Agriculture, Abeokuta, Ogun State.
Agwai’s and Anenih’s warnings will resonate with most Nigerians. There is indeed widespread concern among Nigerians that the not-so-recent American doomsday prognosis about Nigeria becoming a failed state in 2015 is probably a wee-bit optimistic; the recent outbreak of attack on oil installations by armed ethnic militias in the Delta region, not to mention the recent messy constitutional crisis in Oyo State and the rise of armed militias in several states in the hitherto relatively peaceful North, suggest that the failure of the Nigerian state may occur much sooner than 2015, that is, if it has not failed already.
However, even though the warnings from Agwai and Anenih will resonate with most Nigerians, there are those, including this journalist, who believe the warnings lack credibility because of the very persons who have issued them.
Among those who think Agwai is the wrong person to warn anyone against truncating democracy are the editors of The Comet. Two Tuesdays ago i.e. on January 17, the newspaper carried a highly critical editorial on the army chief’s warning. Nigeria’s democracy, the paper said, may be in a mess and Agwai, as an ordinary citizen, has a right to express his disgust at the mess. “As a citizen,” said the paper, “Lt-Gen. Agwai has an inalienable right to be concerned with happenings in his country, which to be sure, is not witnessing the best of times. It is scandalous that a purported democracy should gladly suffer so much illegality and impunity.”
However, the problem with Agwai’s warning, said the newspaper, is that the army chief is not an ordinary Nigerian. “He is”, the newspaper said, “a civil servant of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and then the CAS – two positions that ought to have imposed on him some tact and circumspection.”
Over the years, said the newspaper, the military has developed “the conceit” that they have a greater stake in Nigeria’s existence than other Nigerians simply because they have guns. Such a “mindset”, the newspaper argued, had led to coups and it is a mindset that may have prompted Agwai’s warning. It is for this reason, said the newspaper, that Agwai’s warning “should be slammed by all right thinking Nigerians.”
The Chief of Army Staff can channel his worries quietly to his political boss, said The Comet. If, however, he felt too strongly about the current state of affairs to keep his peace, continued the paper, “he has the option of resigning his commission. That way, he would be free to, in the media, tell his boss his own mind.”
It is difficult to argue with The Comet’s logic. Even in a nascent democracy such as ours, the military is to be seen not heard. In any case the military ought to know by now that it does not and cannot hold a veto over the political process.
Agwai is, however, the wrong person to warn politicians against truncating our democracy not only because he is a civil servant and the army chief. He is the wrong person to issue such a warning also because he is a direct and willing beneficiary of the apparent decision of his commander-in-chief to politicize the military inspite of all claims to the contrary.
This politicization is obvious from the president’s use of his discretion to extend the services of the army top brass at a time others below them are being retired in their tens, if not hundreds. As the army chief himself knows, he ought to have left the army in March last year. His immediate boss, the Chief of Defense Staff, General Alexander Ogomudia, ought also to have retired in October 2004. The Chief of Air Staff, Vice Marshal Wuyep ought to have gone in October last year. Ditto the police chief, Mr. Sunday Ehindero. For some not-so-inexplicable reason, their commander-in-chief decided to retain them.
The rules of retirement say both rank and file must leave the military after 35 years of service or 55 years of age, which ever comes first. On both counts, the army top brass that have been retained, including Agwai, have overstayed their tenure. The selective use of the rules of retirement by the authorities to retain Ogomudia and other very senior officers can only suggest one thing – politics. Agwai should be more worried about the danger this selective retirement of military personnel poses to the internal cohesion and discipline of the institution than about the antics of politicians.
As a willing beneficiary of this selective use of the rules of retirement, it is apparent that Agwai cannot waive his fingers at his benefactors. It is obvious therefore that his warning is only directed at opposition politicians within and outside the ruling PDP. Yet the biggest threat to our democracy is not from the opposition. The greatest threat to our democracy comes from the determination of a clique within the ruling party to manipulate our constitution so as to allow the president to serve a third term, and possibly, even a life-time.
Near the very top of this clique of political manipulators is Chief Anenih, the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the ruling party. It was the same Anenih who, contrary to all democratic norms, told Nigerians in 2002, well ahead of the 2003 elections, that there was no vacancy in the Presidential Villa. It is the same Anenih who told Nigerians recently, again contrary to all democratic norms, that only the President and no one else, not the PDP Congress, and presumably not even Nigerians, can decide who becomes our president in 2007.
From these antecedents alone, it is obvious that Anenih is the least qualified person to lecture anyone on the ills of undermining the country’s democracy and unity.
But, as I’ve said, not only is he the wrong person to preach the virtues of keeping faith with Nigeria’s democracy and unity, his preaching is directed at the wrong quarters. This much should be obvious from his superlative praise of his boss in his acceptance speech for his honourary doctorate.
I do not know what scientific basis Anenih has for his assertion that farmers are the most selfless people anywhere. What I do know for sure is that farmers, like lawyers or journalists, or doctors, or soldiers, or politicians, or whatever, have their fair share of heroes as well as of villains.
In any case there are many Nigerians, not least Brigadier-General Benjamin Adekunle, who lost his command to Obasanjo in the twilight of our civil war, as well as the founding fathers of the ruling PDP, virtually all of whom the president has ran out of town, so to speak, who, far from seeing him as a selfless leader, probably consider him as someone with an uncanny ability of reaping where others have sown.
If Agwai and Anenih wish their warnings against truncating our young democracy and even dividing our country to be taken seriously by Nigerians inspite of the fact that they are the wrong persons to issue them, they ought to be reminding the president that his third term agenda can only ruin a reputation he had built for himself as the first Nigerian military leader to apparently relinquish power voluntarily back in 1979. By talking in generalities about politicians threatening our peace and unity while at the same time encouraging the president to break faith with a constitution he swore to uphold, Agwai and Anenih should know that they are deceiving no one but themselves. If they do not know, they should be told.
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