WEDNESDAY COLUMN BY USSIJU MEDANER
info@medaner.com, justme4justice@yahoo.com
Finally, we are here. It has been months of intricate gaming; months of election campaigns characterised by sentimental rhetoric across the board, games of betrayals, activations of delicate lines of religion and ethnicity to divide the citizens to an end; the unleashing of the fullest power of the cabals to stop some certain individuals from attaining power; and summarily, a time, Nigeria and Nigerians would forever live to remember.
This week, I have a three-part piece, courtesy of multi-events dictating the pace of the moment in the country, and the exigency of time to relate with them all, in and timely.
Part one:
Whatever happens in the next few days; whatever the outcome of the presidential election, Nigeria would still be the ultimate loser of the process, from the beginning to the end. From independence, and till now, the most potent weapon that has been used against this country and its people to keep us in perpetual slavery under a few among us has been the twin elements of ethnicity and religious affiliations; again and again, we had failed to get it right, failed to do the right thing for the country because the hunger to maintain allegiances to both our ethnic affiliation and, or religious beliefs drives us far more than patriotism to the cause of the nation and state of Nigeria. We would speak of deep concerns for the wellness of the country, but we will act to decimate it with our eventual toxic actions and wordings.
The candidates do not hide their readiness to weaponise these elements once again to win the election. Atiku Abubakar of PDP made it clear from the outset (at the Arewa House)that the northerners must vote their own; he did not mince word across the northern states and at every possible fora, to remind the northerners that they must vote for him because he is one of them; summarily, the PDP game strategy is presenting the party candidate as the northern candidate, ultimately pitching the regions against each other. And of course, Atiku spent the last three weeks to this day organising and convincing some Islamic clerics and imams across the region to use the last Friday prayer before the election to preach his candidacy and employ their people to cast their votes for him. It wasn’t all about capacity nor of recorded antecedents, but religion and ethnicity.
It is even worse with the Labour Party candidate, Peter Obi. A staunch Catholics, who used the machinery of state power in Anambra to victimise every other Christian denominations and did not at any time hide his absolute disdain for the other denominations or religion, suddenly pushes himself to become the church man; appearing beside clergies and occupying pulpits at every presented opportunities to appear as the church man and candidate. It is obvious the target of Peter Obi is the bulk Christian population across the North Central, North East and the entire South; though infeasible, but that has been the dream permutation.
Another worrisome element of the Peter Obi candidacy and campaign strategy is the tribal colouration written all over the campaign. Peter Obi is undoubtedly the Igbo candidate; his presidency is not a Nigeria project but the South East Project and by extension Christians candidate. The region has put everything on hold to ascend the exalted throne, including halting the Biafra agitation and suspending the IPOB activities to some extent, and winding all the resources into Peter Obi campaign. That is the truth; even for the first time in a long time, they rejected the customary sit-at-home, all to make sure they deliver. The subtle message to all South Easterners across the states of the country is to vote their own. A vote for Peter Obi will be a vote for Biafra.
How then can we dream of a united Nigeria after the elections? How will candidates who are busy segregating the people around religious and tribal lines ever be able to organise a united Nigeria after the seed they have sown and nurtured to germination. PDP did the same in 2015 and again in 2019 against Buhari; the party turned the Christian community against the Muslims on the back of a non-existing islamisation agenda; and also went ahead to turn the rest of the country against the Fulani nation within the country, claiming the existence of a fulanisation agenda. We have spent the last eight years propagating the same divisions, and living with the consequences of the divisions, and yet we have not learnt our lesson.
The candidacy of the APC flag bearer is unique; a Yoruba man from the West, is expecting his bulk votes from the North, with the real support for his candidacy all the way from the primary elections coming from the North. The same man has his major opposition coming from within the West; from among his people, who are rooting for candidates from other regions without hiding it. In the coming 2023 elections, there may be a South West candidate, a Yoruba candidate on paper, but in reality, there is no such. Tinubu is a Yoruba man leaning on the North and the South to win the presidential election, because his greatest opposition is from among his own people.
Part two
The opposition to the APC candidate is at full throttle with the unmasking of the cabal’s final onslaughts to truncate his campaign and eventual emergence as the winner of the 2023 presidential election. All hell broke loose, not just on the target candidate but all Nigerians, with the hard biting masked attempt to starve the campaign of liquidity and place it at a disadvantage with respect to other contestants, and especially, their preferred candidate whom they have fed with needed funds for election day financing. Nigerians are suffering today because these people are hell bent on stopping Tinubu and would not care if anarchy is let loose on the streets, as long as their goal is achieved.
We are seeing betrayal at its rawest form; the same people who were lifted by Tinubu’s political sagaciousness and magnanimous disposition to contribute immensely to the enthronement of President Buhari in 2015 and still refuse to, succumb to pressure from the main opposition, PDP, in 2019, to work against Buhari to benefit their candidate, are all out to prevent the emergence of the same Tinubu.
Emefiele, working with his cabal team, there Agbor conspiracy include Elumelu of UBA bank and Ovia of Zenith bank; and doing the bidding of their preferred candidate Okowa, (the Vice Presidential candidate of Atiku Abubakar), would want Nigerians to think APC is at war with itself. No, there is no war in APC. The president has been ill-advised that he could round up his anti-corruption fight with the currency redesign and demonetisation policy, while the main intention of the originators of the policy is to use it as an election winning strategy. The policy also serves as a ploy for him to distract the general public from the heavy cases hanging over him as he keeps dodging prosecution, including securing court order for protection and even going as far as procuring the service of the Nigerian Military for a 24-hours protection. Nevertheless, the DSS is still relentless in its investigation of Emefiele over suspicion of terrorism financing. The currency change provides a distraction for him and to weep up public sympathy in his favour. This particularly serves him in obtaining a restraining order against DSS. And this is not to say the policy is not favouring his cronies in the financial sector, particularly the payment service providers despite the weak infrastructure to carry out a decent cashless transaction. You are charged for transferring your money and for receiving money even if it is N100 and for even attempting the service with all the associated troubles which by now all those who are compelled to use the service can attest to. This policy, so far, affects the masses the most.
However, APC governors should not have bothered to be the one speaking out against the controversial policy, but they are voicing the same concern as all; including international voices on the issue.
APC is not at war with itself; PDP is the problem of Nigeria and Nigerians. PDP is behind it all; the fuel scarcity, the currency redesign and mopping out; working through the party mole left behind in APC in 2015 – Emefiele. No wonder all the loudest support for the policy came from PDP, all the way from Atiku Abubakar to the minnows down the ladder. It is their policy and designed pathway to electoral victory. But, it is already backfiring. The same Atiku Abubakar, who in the ecstasy of seeing the policy achieving his purpose, by vocally telling CBN and the presidency not to back down on the policy implementation even when Nigerians were grossly suffering and looking up to them to speak out for the masses. Now, suddenly after realising his position will hurt his chances, has suddenly turned around to calling for the same actions he has been objecting to; now, he wants CBN to react, make new currency available. He now wants commercial banks to collect old notes from the people. Is it because he loves them? No, the sudden realisation that his antics are backfiring has once again brought out the instability and inconsistency in him.
Part three:
There have been palpable fears within the APC fold about the party presidential candidate’s path to victory. This concern is justified given the intensity of media work, fake news and propaganda coming from the opposition and the activities of the cabal mounting pressure on the campaign, but I do not share in these fears nor the worries that the election may not go our way; why? Firstly, the election would be held this Saturday physically and not on social media, real men and women who are rational enough to know the origin of the difficulties the country is plunged into in the last few months would constitute the bulk of voters on Saturday. Capacity and antecedents would top the table when the final decisions would be made, Nigerians would follow Tinubu because unlike Atiku Abubakar, who is totally alienated from reality of Nigeria problems and the pathways to solutions, and a Peter Obi who knows all our challenges because they are in the public domain, but is full of numerical gyration, comparing us with nations after nations without presenting any local antidote; we will follow a man who knows the problem, and readily presents the practical responses along with historical antecedents to marshal the implementation. The latest opinion poll from the Daily Sun of 21st February 2023 has projected Tinubu to win 19 of the states in the coming presidential election and that he stands a better chance than the rest of the contestants. Another favourable poll for the APC presidential candidate is from Daily Trust of 21st February 2023 which projects him to win 2023 presidential election.
This Saturday, the self-centered clergies would once again receive the same shame they got in 2015 and 2019. Proponents of ethnic colouration to the election would receive their portions of the shame too; believe me, the silent soldiers, the voters who stayed off the media to evade attacks would show their faces this Saturday for the hope that Nigeria needs; the RENEWED HOPE.
GOD BLESS THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA;
As someone rightly said, Nigerians know the difference between the man who talks of refineries, conglomerates, railways, ports, export processing zones, cement factories, new cities, and power plants he attracted to Lagos as governor, and another who boasts of bringing a brewery and saving state resources in self-owned banks when the same state is suffering; or of another who mistakenly sold off state-owned businesses for peanuts as he later confessed to Kadri, a journalist during the 2019 presidential election debates.
Fuel scarcity, currentcy scarcity, or whatever, would not decide the 2023 election. They are all strategies that fail at source.
