Still on the Electoral Act Forgery
By
Paul Mamza
[AHMADU BELLO UNIVERSITY]
Against all ethos, the nation rose up one
morning to witness
a historic attempt to reinforce an entrenching political fixation
by its ruling elite in order to end the encroaching tragic articulation
of the local tides generated by the opposition ally. When the
matter became an issue of public discourse, the leaders of the
three arms government added grace to the illogical insertion
of the controversial clause which many see as a grand conspiracy
to disallow true democratic evolution. This quizzical disconsolation
act had a dark irony that none of the figures involved in the
forgery has been punished for these aborted devastating and
deadly apolitical racketeering. If the demand of instilling
and flourishing a mentally equipped political culture is a worthwhile
then the postponement of saddened evil documentation in that
regard can only suppress rationality for a pernicious pogrom.
It did not happen now, but obviously the unstructured mind-
set by this postponement has an intact nomenclature that will
breed fetid stagnation and entrench suicidal fixation in our
political terrain. Even the fall-out of the divergent unfit
statements by the President, Senate President and Speaker of
the House of Representatives on their assumed roles in the insertion
of the controversial act had a conflicting affront to the personality
who directed or effected the 'Printer's Devil' machinations.
Having noticed the level of frustrations of the citizenry against
the current civilian government, the Cable News Network (CNN)
in a twist reaction concluded that Nigerians are better-of during
the military regimes. To this effect the Minister of Information
and National Orientation, Prof. Jerry Gana and his counterpart
in the Ministry of Integration in Africa reacted swiftly to
the report by condemning it. The Labour Leader, Comrade Adams
Oshiomole boasted re-affirmly that should military intervene
due to the current problems the nation find itself in, he will
mobilize all workers to go on strike until the military Junta
steps-down. No one can question the rationality behind resisting
military regimes but I doubt very much if the labour leader
having failed to successfully mobilized his colleagues against
the civilian regime can muster courage to mobilize his colleagues
against a military Junta. What Oshiomole fail to perceive is
that any military intervention now will be disastrous not because
it is a military regime but because it will totally be confrontational
to 'doing business as usual'. That is why we pray that it doesn't
happen.
The Obasanjo Presidency's embryonic portent to
sustain itself
in power has explanation in the unchecked activities of OPC
militia-men fighting daggers to reserve an ethnic interest,
the appeasement of the Yoruba group and confrontation against
any form of opposition. The electoral act forgery is just a
remote ladder in aiding this perpetuation. There's no doubt
that if the late Yoruba sage, Chief Obafemi Awolowo is a patriarch
and defender of Yoruba cause, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo is a patriarchal
monarch and emperor in amplifying the protection of this interest.
Even Awo wouldn't have snuffed other ethnic groups the right
to equitable and justifiable means as this current display of
tribalism by the government of Obasanjo. The fear of being
labeled a nepotistic by his contemporaries would have deprived
him of ascending the position of tribal-lordship in politics.
His intentions then was that of hybrid between a regionalist
and a nationalist, that is why some still classify him amongst
the Nigerian past Nationalist. The Obasanjo's seriousness in
securing a base in the southwest preparatory to the 2003 election
made him to degenerate from the Obasanjo-father of all in 1976-1979
to Obasanjo - father of only the Yorubas in the recent times.
No one will quarrel with these facts after visiting parastatals
and ministries to take statistics of government employees and
appointed personnel or after analyzing the barbaric acts of
the OPC militiamen against other ethnic groups during this present
democratic rule. But even serious intentions may not necessarily
be a qualification to a justifiable means, it is the quest to
translate serious intentions to justifiable means that led to
the murder of the former Justice Minister and Attorney General
of Federation, Chief `Bola Ige due to the Osun political crisis.
Another concentric compulsion that had tendered yet another
topsy-turvy torment on the psyche of the civil society is the
un-statemanly and unguarded utterances of the President in the
recent times. Starting with the unpatriotic generalization
of lecturers as a bunch of irresponsible citizens, to grading
of the members of the armed forces as 'area-boys' and developing
a 'stoned-heart' response at the situations surrounding the
'Black Sunday' explosion at the Ikeja cantonment, the cynicism
combined with an amalgam of elements of carelessness is no doubt
a manifestation of an uncaring leader. But leaders engulfed
in a moral crisis should not expect its followership to be a
better ensemble, because if the head is sick, the body will
obviously follow suit. When anti-corruption sermon is preached
rather than being practiced the leadership should be held liable
for any corrupt practice in the society and the citizenry cannot
claim to have leaders, when the leaders are not sympathetic
to their cause. If the present democratic experience is worthy
of reviewing, the worst military regime in Nigeria is better
than it. This is because all the components of democracy is
not working. Nigerians are more disunited now than ever before,
Justice has been compromised in a great detail, the security
of the nation is grossly pathetic, accountability has ceased
to operate, Equity is a thing of he past, Fairness is a strange
word and nepotism has taken over the centre-stage. While one
cannot rule out the acts of sabotage in any government (both
civilian and military) but a keen observer of the Obasanjo's
government has no option than to conclude that the problems
the nation is witnessing now is in-built by the operators of
our democratic system rather than by the persons/groups desperately
aiming at grabbing power from an embattled President. Afterall,
there is a law in the country that can deal decisively with
any 'disgruntled politician' trying to heat up the polity.
The recent reflection of the state of nation by the House of
representative members is a clear indication of the failure
in the current democratic setting, where hoodlums are given
state cover as shown in the continuous OPC killings of people
of Northern origin in Lagos and its environs, the sub-version
of peoples participation as contained in the obnoxious law called
the electoral act, fraud as typified by the examination malpractices
that hit the law college of the recent time and utter negligence
as exemplified by Lagos explosion. There's no better story
of misery than this dramatic descent to chaos during the two
and half years of the so-called democratic rule. Some say a
constructive criticism on these matters is tantamount to heating-up
the polity, not knowing that it is the operators that heats
up the polity. The polity already has been over heated by the
actions and inactions of the government, which if care is not
taken will soon reach a point of evaporation and if this happens
there will obviously be a vacuum. Since nature abhors a vacuum
the guess is as best as we can all imagine. But who is to blame
for all these failures should not be a muscle- pulling event.
If the intention of the electoral act forgery is to forcibly
secure a maximum political space, the substrate of reinforcement
cannot be devoid of naked power play typical of military commandos
at war with each other. It is this militarized interplay of
forces at the political scene that may open a new gate for military
intervention. As Chief Sunday Awoniyi Stated in his recent
interview with Weekly Trust of February 15-21, 2002 the North
and Ibos will not vote for Obasanjo in 2003 because the President
had betrayed the two regions. No person except a political
slave that will vote for a leader that openly derive pleasure
at executing unjust and unfair policies against him. Unless
if the unimaginable will play itself out in the current political
equilibrium of contradictions, it is difficult for the self-succession
monstrosity to cleanse the nation of a symptom of an impending
political neurosis. But since national interest has been buried
in the sands of ardent relegation, it is quite easy to display
authoritarianism in the Nigerian political landscape without
a magical realism. The humiliating experiences of the past
may not be unconnected to the current negative political dialectics.
While the vicious circle had become intact, the spiritually
disoriented knavery had secured a convenient habitation in the
crippled anti-corruption crusade of the government. Apparently,
the tribal alignments will unravel the mysteries behind the
conspiracy of imposition of political masters within the continuum
of conglomerate of suffocating political scoundrels, with
each left with the burden of counting a dwindling fortune in
politics. May God save Nigeria. Amin.