FRIDAY DISCOURSE WITH DR. ALIYU TILDE
(DISCOURSE 279)
Yar'adua: Testing the Nerve of
Nigerians
aliyutilde@yahoo.com
I was prompted to write this article by
what I consider to be a very important revelation by the BBC Hausa
Service which it aired just an hour ago, 6.30am, 4 January 2010.
It reported that it contacted the King Faisal Hospital (KFH), Jeddah,
to learn about the hospitalization of Yar'adua. An official of the
Hospital who spoke to the radio station said Yar'adua is not on
admission in the Hospital. When it inquired if he was there earlier,
the official asked it to direct its enquiry to the Nigerian Embassy in
Saudi Arabia.
The revelation, coming from the BBC, was
a shock to me. Though I have never believed all the stories told by
government officials on this matter before, my imagination never went
as far as questioning his whereabouts. Some Nigerian newspapers and
internet discussion groups have reported the same story earlier but I
deflected it as mere conjecture. However, this morning the story was
coming from the BBC, a media house which has kept a difficult balance
between British imperial interest and objective journalism. I quickly
concluded that Yar'adua's illness is becoming more serious than I
thought.
The Story
The sickness of the President has raised
serious constitutional and political issues here at home. This is an
issue that started with the rumour of his death, which the authorities
denied a day later. However, as the days passed, the pessimism about
his condition grew especially with the official revelation that he had
a heart failure. A week later, there was the news of his possible
relocation to Germany which was abandoned by his aides because it will
exacerbate the political temperature and embolden the opposition.
Matters worsened when it was clear that
the President left the country without handing over to the
Vice-President. So the latter could not constitutionally attend to
urgent matters of state needing immediate attention. The advice for
resignation of the President in the interest of his health was
rejected; the call for the Federal Executive Council carries out its
constitutional responsibility of ascertaining his condition of health
was rebuffed; the appeal to the President to hand over power
temporarily to the Vice President was turned down; finally, the
suggestion that the President be shown on video to convince doubting
Thomases and re-assure his teaming well-wishers at home and abroad was
dismissed. These are the suggestions of Nigerians who do not seem to
know the real condition of the President. As for those who know it,
they are involved in the intrigues of succession: Who should succeed
Yar'adua and who should not.
Then last week something curious took
place. Officials claimed that the President has signed the
supplementary budget. Judging from the hundreds of commentaries in the
media, this was taken by so many Nigerians as another lie. There were
counter claims that the signature was forged, not least by the G58
group, who did not hesitate to remind Nigerians that the official who
took the file to Saudi Arabia for the President's signature, Mr. David
Edevbie, is already on trial in a British court on charge of forgery,
among other things. For the first time also, the Chief Justice of the
Federation was sworn in by his predecessor, not by the President or
his deputy. Etc. The military is also operating without a
Commander-in-Chief. I wonder, as another commentator said on radio,
who gave the command for the army to quell the kala kato riot
in Bauchi early last week.
The political atmosphere in the country
was so thickened by the smoke of doubt that some journalists rose to
the occasion and started contacting the KFH on the real state of the
matter. The BBC, it appears now, was just one of them. I am convinced
that its report that the President is not at KFH is true and it
is strengthened by the refusal of the Nigerian Embassy in Jeddah to
answer the call of the station. The whereabouts of Yar'adua, the
Nigerian President and Commander-in-Chief of its armed forces is not
known to its citizens.
How Sick?
Now, after concluding on the uncertainty
of the President's whereabouts, we can now move to the next question.
What actually is the condition of health of the President? Is he
sufficiently ill to consider himself or describe him as "unable to
discharge the functions of his office?" Here we will be guided by a
number of facts, all leading to a very gloomy conclusion.
First. As a carryover from the previous
section, the President's whereabouts speaks volumes about the gravity
of his illness. Any illness which will require his treatment overseas,
beyond the National Hospital or any of our Teaching Hospitals must be
qualified as sufficient to prevent him from running the affairs of
state at least temporarily. In this case, the President was rushed to
KFH, almost the best you can find in the rich Kingdom. As if that was
not enough, he is now moved elsewhere, to a more sophisticated one, in
the Kingdom or beyond it. Does the nation need more to tell it how
serious is the President's illness?
Two. The President has now spent
forty-two days away. What other than a debilitating illness would keep
him absent from office and the country for so long? Or has he
proceeded on a holiday in the Bahamas or is he cooling off on one of
artificial Islands of Dubai or in one of palatial harems of Saudi
princes that are rich in both fruit and flesh? No. These are not his
habits, if we will be fair to him.
Three. The President was unable
to carry out the obligation of handing over the affairs of state to
his deputy when he left for medication, suggesting, in the best of
scenarios, that he too ill to do so. To claim otherwise means that he
absconded in violation of constitutional provisions.
Four. All what his aides said about
what he will do on his trip did not happen. He was not at the summit
of Arafat; he did not return "next week"; he did not sign files daily,
otherwise, the supplementary budget would not have waited so long;
etc. His inability to do any of these indicates that his condition is
serious.
Five. There is no contact between him
and people that should be reaching out to him. All the claims by
Jonathan and some of his ministers that they are in constant
communication with him have now proved to be blatant lies. We had some
reports that some people visited Saudi Arabia to see him initially.
Now we have none. When as a candidate in 2007 the rumour of his death
was circulated, the then President Obasanjo contacted him on telephone
in far away Germany to the hearing of the crowd at the rally. "Umoru
they said you are dead. Tell dem say you dey kampe." said
Obasanjo. The recuperating Yar'adua then replied that he was healthy.
The matter was immediately put to rest. Obasanjo could be ingenious
sometimes. Today, Obasanjo has the same stake in the health of
Yar'adua as he had in 2007, if not more. He has a telephone. The whole
nation is here, ready to listen, once again. Yet, there is no call
going, and no answer coming. Instead, Obasanjo has moved from his
house at Ota to Abuja, negotiating the deals of succession.
Six. Since the 'pericarditis theory'
proffered by his personal physician at the beginning of his illness
and the stories that he 'is fast recovering' from his wife, there is
not any official report about the deterioration or progress of his
health. Would the President be hiding the deterioration as a sign of
his disdain for Nigerians or concealing the progress in order to taunt
them? Both vices could not be the trade of any honourable leader with
sufficient commitment to his people. And the Yar'adua who won the
subsisting peace in the Niger Delta, who increased our electricity
supply from its dwindling status to over 5,000MW, and who is the
champion of Vision 2020 and 7-Point Agenda is indeed sufficiently
committed to Nigeria. The heart, however, speaks through an
interpreter: the body. So if we have not heard from his willing heart,
we are free to conclude that the body is surely seriously sick and
incapable.
Seven. The handlers of the President and
other officials are incapable of producing an audio or video recording
of the President doing anything for forty-two straight days. This is
unusual. Presidents are human. They fall sick as any of us does.
Agreed. However, whenever they do, all means are employed to explain
their level of illness by showing the physical state of their
conditions to reassure their citizens or aid them in preparation for
the inevitable, thereby closing the gates of uncertainty. Nigerian
officials have defied this custom and their inability can only mean
that they have something grievous to hide. They are afraid of the
power of information. The secrecy that shrouds the illness of any
President should only signify the imminent fear of his political
demise and the hopelessness about their fate.
To conclude this section, I would like
to state that I am fully convinced, from the foregoing, that the
illness of the President has reached a state of serious concern for
the nation: that he is indeed "unable to discharge the functions of
his office" as required by the constitution? Who will argue to the
contrary on the basis of facts or logic? I put forward a challenge…
The Duty
Let us now briefly explore what the
constitution prescribes under the circumstance. To be fair to the
President, I doubt very much if he is in any position to communicate
his opinion on the matter. Section 145 of the constitution that
demands his personal transmission of his bad condition to the Senate
cannot apply. We have missed that chance months ago.
We are left with Sections 144 and 146.
The former is hinged on the President "suffering from such infirmity
of body or mind as renders him permanently incapable of discharging
his functions of his office", the ascertainment of which will involve
the Federal Executive Council (FEC), a team of medical experts and the
Senate. That is why Nigerians called on the FEC to do initiate the
investigation right from the beginning of the problem and it refused.
Section 146 speaks about the Vice President holding office of the
President "if the office of the President becomes vacant by reason of
death or resignation, impeachment, permanent incapacity or the removal
of the President from office for any other reason in accordance with
Section 143 or 144 of the constitution."
Now, with the President refusing or
unable to transmit his inability to discharge his duty as President
and the FEC refusing to undertake an investigation into his illness,
where do we turn to? Our options lie with the judiciary and the
legislature. That is why some Nigerians went to court demanding an
order compelling FEC to act accordingly. I hope the court will act in
the best interest of the country in this moment of trial. The National
Assembly, without waiting for the court, can, as a start, pass a
resolution which it will require the FEC to oblige.
Right now there is nothing anyone can do
to install Jonathan as Acting President. It is shameful that FEC
members have chosen to give priority to their interest over that of
the country in gross violation of their oath of office. What is wrong
with a mere investigation? Why should anyone abdicate if he is not
hiding something? But this is an insolence which they cannot hold for
long. Unless something is done, Nigeria itself will be infected by the
President's contagion. As I indicated in my first article on the
matter, we must say no to any leadership by proxy similar to that of
Kamuzu Banda of Malawi, as a recent contributor warned. It is Yar'adua
who took the oath of office as President, not any other. We want him
here or we must be allowed to see him there.
I consider this as the most important
test for the Yar'adua administration so far. Should the future prove
its officials guilty of such grievous matters like concealment, fraud
and forgery, which they cannot escape the longer they fail to tell the
truth, Nigerians will welcome their prosecution later. Then, we will
not pay attention to anyone claiming that he is being persecuted."
Aha.
In addition, there is the need for
everybody to put up a fight in order to save this nation from an
imminent crisis. Media houses need to be more forthcoming. They should
investigate and inform us of their findings on the illness of the
President and his location. They should be ready to express the
opinions of Nigerians about the matter. We need powerful editorials.
The NBA and other professional bodies, labour unions, student
organizations, religious bodies, elders, market women, political
parties including the PDP, etc, should all come out and give their
contribution.
Other nations have an obligation to the
citizens of this country not to conceal the truth about the matter. No
nation should be an accomplice in the dubious crime of concealment. If
it does so to Nigeria in its dire moment of need, we will definitely
count it as an enemy. We are appealing to the patriotic citizens of
that country as well as their governments to furnish us with any
necessary details about the matter. Here, no country carries this
burden more than Saudi Arabia, the country which the President first
visited and where he, possibly, remains to date.
The Future
In the end, the world will act
commensurate with our actions. It will be willing to give us whatever
respect we deserve from how we handle the affairs of our nation. We
have faced many challenges before. On the one hand, we won some. We
won independence from the British, reunited the country after an
unfortunate civil war, recaptured power from the military twice, and
won the battles of June 12 and Third Term. On the other, we lost many.
For over forty years we lost the battles against corruption, nepotism,
sectarianism, election rigging and an entrenched capacity to destroy
whatever is standing. In the forgone struggles, history has recorded
people accordingly. It saluted those who sacrificed and condemned
those who succumbed. The country is today held captive. Yar'adua
administration is testing our nerves. It is left to each of us to
decide what history would scribble for his or her on its pages. And
the pages of history are many, just as its judgement could be damning.
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