By Steve Osuji
HOW AREWA SUCKERED YORUBA: Triumphalism, like a wild bushfire, is raging across the southwest of Nigeria! The man of the moment, Bola Tinubu is being erroneously collaged into the image of a lion, a king kong and a great sage fused into one. A Yoruba people, long starved for a hero since Awo, are building BAT altars and groves even in their other rooms already!
Of course they don’t want their balloons pricked right now; that would seem like killjoy syndrome anyway but we must whisper these few words of caution to the ears of our Yoruba kin and indeed, all Nigerians. This is in expected that someone not too suffused with hysteria, might extract the intel in it for the good of Nigeria.
THE FALLACY OF BAT’S POLITICAL SAGACITY: Straight away, it’s a fallacy that BAT’s victory at the APC primary is the outcome of his political strategies or the results of deft political calculations. No. If anything, BAT has deployed his ocean of wealth to purchase the presidential candidacy of Nigeria’s ruling party. Even at that, the northern kakistocrats have only allowed him to have it seeing that it might serve their longterm interest of clinging on to power.
What we have, therefore, is the outcome of a devious plot by northern hegemonists who want to keep power perpetually in the north. Put plainly, they have manipulated APC delegates to ALLOW Tinubu to win. They could have simply whispered to all the northern delegates to vote someone else, like VP Osinbajo.
THE YAR’ADUA DE JA VU: By their calculations, a badly ailing Tinubu would reenact the Umaru Musa Yar’Adua de ja vu. Recall that in 2007, outgoing President Olusegun Obasanjo manipulated an ailing Umaru Musa Yar’Adua into power as president in a very bizarre turn of event. As many people feared, Yar’Adua didn’t survive the first term and power reverted to the south.
Our northern power manipulators have just dusted up that template!
By the calculations of the northern powerbrokers, an ailing Tinubu may become incapacitated or pass on (God forbid) and his vice president, a northern Muslim, would take over power. He would complete Tinubu’s term and hold on to power for two terms of eight years. This is the gameplan of the north and that is why they ALLOWED BAT to win.
PLAYING GAMES WITH NIGERIA: Every sane person watching the live telecast of the APC presidential primary would have seen enough reason, right there, to reject the emergence of BAT. As he walked to the podium to make his brief remarks, he stumbled and had to be steadied by an aid. As he presented his written speech, he had a helluva time turning the pages. At the end of the day when he was declared winner, he had much difficulty grasping the party flag and lofting it to his supporters. It is clear that BAT is seriously ailing and it’s the most cynical if not sinister act ever meted to Nigeria and Nigerians to unleash a sick president on a nation. The north is obviously playing pranks with the country here. It’s deliberate enemy action against the people of Nigeria to wilfully foist BAT on the country after Nigeria has literalky been a sick bay during the Buhari presidency.
AND THEY SHOVED OSINBAJO UNDER THE BUS: Thinking Nigerians are still baffled why a party like APC which has had a torrid time managing President Muhammadu Buhari’s ailment in hospitals across the world to have positioned another sick candidate for the job. Not when there’s a better and more viable alternative like the vice president, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, among others.
The VP has been a quiet and unobtrusive understudy of the the Buhari presidency. He is younger, fitter, healthier, sharper, brilliant and possessed of more hands-on experience all round. He is actually cut and fitted for the job. It must be only for the reason of a hidden, underhand agenda that the northern caucus would not shoo in Osinbajo for the job. How ignoble these northern hegemonists!
AFTER BUHARI’S WRETCHED TENURE, NORTH PRESENTS WRETCHED SUCCESSORS:The north’s disdain for Nigeria and Nigerians and their hunger for power trump the urgent need for a worthy successor like Prof. Osinbajo to lead Nigeria at this critical juncture of our nationhood.
Even in the main opposition party, PDP, the north made sure to also present an ailing, old and analogue bloke whose life’s purpose and vision is primitive accumulation wealth. The north subverted the PDP’s constitution and bribed delegates blind to grab the ticket through Atiku Abubakar.
One would expect the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to seek to make amends for President Buhari’s very poor outing during his two terms ending mid 2023. One would expect the party to select the ablest individual and best mind available to them (Osinbajo), to seek to reverse the mess Buhari has left Nigeria in. But their interest is in crude politiking.
Nigeria’s exchange rate has fallen about 300% since 2015 that APC took the mantle of power. Likewise every other Human Development Index of measure. Buhari and APC have led Nigeria to becoming the poverty capital of the world. Inflation has remained in double digits since APC came to power; petroleum products imports have increasing debilitatingly as all of Nigeria’s refineries have packed up even though billions are spent annually maintaining the moribund facilities…
Yet, all the north cares about is just power for the heck of it. Power without purpose; power without progress; power without passion for human development.
NORTH WOULD INSTALL A HAWK AS BAT’s RUNNING MATE: It’s already the season for headhunting running mates. North would nuturally hand in hawks like Governor El Rufai of Kaduna, Gov. Abdulahi Ganduje of Kano or Governor Babagana Zulum of Borno State. Any of these would not only present adequate checkmate to a bruised BAT and his wily and highly enlightened corps, they would be an easy stand-in in case the unexpected (?) happens.
On the other hand, a southern wimp or clown would emerge as Atiku’s running mate. Need we mention them?
WHAT CAN BAT DELIVER? In summary, like Buhari, BAT, if he wins, would spend half of his tenure ensconced in tony London hospices and care homes. Like Buhari, he would soon tell us how he would have wished he was much younger. He would refill his barn quickly as a matter of first charge and would deploy much optics and bravura in the place of pressing need for back- breaking work to reclaim and rebuild Nigeria. Like Buhari, urgent files would gather dust on his desk fir sheer lack of stamina.
Were he younger and energetic, BAT may have led a plucky cabinet to deliver a modicum of results but he is far past his time. It would suffice for him to enjoy the soporific effects of the honorifics: PRESIDENT BOLA AHMED TINUBU (PBAT).
This is the exact outcome the power-mongering northern hegemonists intended. Is there anything we, poor Nigerians can do to salvage our country and stave off this evil plot?
▪︎STEVE OSUJI/09.06.22