Hope Betrayed
By
Wada Nas
[KADUNA]
Postponing its national convention has now become the most familiar character of the All Nigeria Peoples Party. If my recollection is correct, this is the fifth time the party is deferring its convention giving itself a very undeserving image.
The one last held between 26th to 28th of July was particularly regrettable and painful and very indicative. The said court order stopping the convention is full of intrigues. Who was the unknown person that sued the party and got such a court order? Nobody was told. He remains a mystery to most members except perhaps to some inside top notchers believed to have plotted the scheme for self-preservation. I will come back to that.
What did the party do when it heard of the court case? It is not on record that it sent a lawyer to defend its interest. Why? Apparently because some faceless fellows want to use the court order as a joker. The theory was that if they were finding their way through, then they would keep mute over the injunction and if not, use it as the last joker and they did so regardless of the pains it inflicted on delegates.
When did the party receive the order given two days ahead of the convention? The general belief at the convention was that it was served on the day of the court ruling but hidden from members in line with the joker theory.
Right ahead of the convention, there were hatched plans, by some officials of the party and elected members, at the executive level to oust some contestants and pave way for favoured candidates. Thus, it was decided, by a clique that the National Chairmanship of the party be zoned to Kano, thereby denying the two other chairmanship candidates from Zamfara and Katsina, respectively, the opportunity to contest. The idea was to go to the convention with an unopposed candidate in the person of the incumbent chairman. The two other candidates threatened action and this didn’t go down well with the inside plotters and schemers.
From no where, a group announced the suspension of the national chairmanship candidate from Zamfara, in a most crude manner. Whoever did this was perhaps unaware that he was inflicting some painful injuries on the party. Whatever anybody would say, the candidate in question is indisputably one of the best Senators of the Federal Republic with a reputation for qualitative principle. Some one once described him as too principled for the dirty waters of Nigerian politics.
There was a terrible rumour at the convention venue that some tazarce-seeking people wanted the party’s status quo to remain in order to ensure tazarce for them. When it was realized that this plot would not scale through, wholesomely, the court order joker was applied to the grave discomfort of delegates whose interests were never taken into account in this matter. If there is any truth to this rumour, and I have but a little reason to hold it so, I fear what would happed in 2003 and I fear for our country as I gravely fear for the fate of democracy. When people want to impose themselves on the electorate, at all cost, there is little hope for the practice of democracy.
The lack of concern for the electorate was much on-display in the court order, case or better still how it was handled. My own reading of events at the convention was that the party was in possession of the order well ahead of the convention. Yet they wasted the time and resources of delegates and contestants for purely selfish reasons. It never mattered to the joker players that many traveled long distance to Abuja for the convention. Nor did the resources pumped into it bother them. It was a clear demonstration that some leaders could sacrifice the people if doing so would satisfy their own pet selfish interests. The problem with Nigeria is that the greater majority of its leaders engage more in the politics of self-seeking interest than the duty of promoting the welfare of the people. The postponement of the ANPP convention, at that point in time, is a sad confirmation of this painful observation.
A powerful section of the delegates, from their actions and inaction, would not mind selling out the party, to the ruling PDP on the platter of tazarce. This gives me doubt as to whether or not the top notchers of the party would not betray their own presidential candidate in favour of that of the PDP. I smelt a sense of every one seeking to belong to the ruling party for the purpose of getting assistance for their individual tazarce programme. Based on my observation, I am inclined to say that some of the high sounding rhetoric’s we have been hearing in the past are without inner substance. All the so-called pro people rhetorics are gimmicks. Quite a number have sold out and would betray the confidence reposed in them. It is terrible how Nigerian politicians could sacrifice the larger interest of the people in favour of clearly selfish reasons. What most say is hardly what they believe in.
I am sad to say that going by events at that convention, it appears to me that some highly placed officials have sold out the poor people of this country who may likely go through another four years of pains and poor performance. Everything to that effect was boldly written on the horizon. There was more of PDP sense than ANPP obligation among some schemers at the convention and this was what made it particularly sad. The more I reflect on what happened the more I am convinced that most Nigerians are ill prepared for opposition politics. Every one wants to belong to the ruling party where he could “go and eat” or get endorsed for tazarce. There was much of this sense on show at the convention discreetly championed by some of the tazarce seekers of the party. It was a disgusting spectacle mired in deceit and insincerity.
In truth, the postponement of the convention was not on account of any court order as such. Rather the order was obtained to oil the wheel of some members. It was a clear abuse of the judicial process. It is condemnable to obtain court orders for decidedly bad intentions mired in selfish reasons. That court order was a plot of selfish intent innocently given by an unsuspecting judge, to protect some narrow-minded interests. The courts must worry that politicians are capable of sacrificing good for evil so long as doing so would promote their interests and should therefore be wary of their antics in this regard.
The loser in the botched convention are not the delegates or contestants but the party itself. At a time when Nigerians are witnessing the rising profile of the ANPP, at a time when they are looking up to it for salvation from the misrule of the PDP and at a time when they are seeing it as the most credible alternative, some elements within, in collaboration with some external forces, got the party badly shot in the foot, such that in time to come people would start questioning its credibility.
No matter how much some may not want it said, the party emerged deformed and disgraced from the convention. It was its saddest day and a lot of image panel beating needs be done to put it in proper shape. Which party leadership would waste so much resources only to squander it to the winds? Who is that party member that may contribute again for a yet another convention must likely to be postponed once more? Who again would trust fully in any other convention of the party having been postponed five times? From this convention the ANPP has put a lot of doubts in the minds of right thinking people. This must be frankly said for us to appreciate the danger in to which the jokers of the party have used their joker to badly dent its image.
I confronted a highly respected and vocal member of the party, and told him that I saw his hands in what happened. He just laught and said delegates from his state were about reaching home, at a time the announcement to postpone the convention was being made. I felt sad that such highly respected personalities could betray the people inspite of their vocal posturing and patriotic pronouncements. I begin to wonder who else would Nigerians trust now if those in whom they placed so much hope could betray them.
I wish to alert Nigerians not to place so much hope in some of our political operators. Their patriotic pronouncements are never from the inner recesses of their minds but from the outward tips of their lips, all of it on the surface. The sincerity is not there. There is more about self-interest than common interest.
I also want to alert Nigerians on certain discreet happenings. Until Mohammed Abacha got acquitted on murder charges and obtained a bail, we never knew that charges of corrupt enrichment have been dropped against a former permanent secretary. Sensing that questions would be asked, as in the case of Gani Adams and Fasenu, the media was fed with the report that Mr. President has ordered a re-visit of the case, on the eve of his departure to Kano.
The trick is clear. How can you morally deny Abacha the benefit of bail when you have long since dropped corruption charges against a favoured citizen? But have the charges been re-visited in truth. When some of us shout “nepotism”, in certain matters, it is not that we are raising false alarm. Rather it is that nepotism is an entrenched character of this administration to such an extent that even lawful court orders could be violated in order to further entrench it.
The so-called executive order ordering a revisit of the case of the said permanent secretary, bearing in mind the publicity given it, is a ruse, to cover up nepotic practices. The intention is to justify keeping Mohammed Abacha behind bars inspite of the various court actions. And the more this is done the greater would the vendetta aspect of the case against him would be exposed. What they cannot get through the courts they want to get it through brute force and torture. Talk of human rights and respect for the due process of the law. And what are media people saying? We are watching and waiting.
Kaduna.