Last week I promised to publish more of the responses to my column of June 17 on the controversy that has trailed Dr. Bukola Saraki election as Senate president, a controversy that does not seem about to go away or even subside so soon. Accordingly I have devoted about a third of today’s column to some of those responses.
Before then, however, some words about President Muhammadu Buhari’s seeming slow speed of decision making and his orders to the country’s service chiefs on June 12 to dismantle the military checkpoints that had riddled our highways and towns.
First, the military checkpoints. In the last four years travelling on our highways and commuting within our towns had become a nightmare, especially in the North where the checkpoints had been more prevalent. They had, on average, nearly doubled travel time within and between towns, had become avenues for extortion of travellers and had occasionally led to the harassment, maiming and even killing of those who dared resist such extortions.
The trade off was supposed to be at least the curtailment of the movement of Boko Haram personnel and their arsenal. Their abduction of Chibok girls two years ago and their frequent bombings of soft targets – schools, churches, mosques, markets and the like – clearly exposed the ineffectiveness of these checkpoints. Indeed, far from securing society from such attacks, the checkpoints constituted potential killing fields; it was a miracle that it apparently never crossed the twisted minds of the insurgents to explode bombs in the massive traffic go-slows and hold-ups caused by the checkpoints. One shudders to imagine the level of human and material destruction that would’ve resulted therefrom.
However, for some inexplicable reasons, President Goodluck Jonathan rejected all entreaties, including those from some former military heads of state who obviously knew a thing or two about national security, physical or otherwise, to dismantle the checkpoints. It was as if someone somewhere was intent on inflicting suffering and pain on Nigerians under the guise of keeping them safe from Boko Haram.
Some people have argued that without the military checkpoints things could’ve been much worse. This is not impossible but the argument is more speculative than factual, given the limited military capacity of Boko Haram, even compared with our hitherto seemingly out-gunned army.
President Muhammadu Buhari may have seemed slow in decision making, but on this issue of military checkpoints, his orders to dismantle them within a month of being sworn in could hardly have been prompter – and more right; if nothing else, it is bound to drastically reduce the cost doing business in the areas affected and lift the terrible trauma of siege mentality the checkpoints had inflicted on people.
All of which takes me back to the first issue of the president’s seemingly slow speed in decision making. Nothing captures this better than a caption story in The Guardian last Sunday. In what is potentially an award winning piece of photo journalism, the newspaper devoted half of its front page to a beautiful picture of a lone tortoise crawling across the huge, but at the time apparently empty, forecourt of the Aso Villa with the bold caption “Slow And Steady Wins The Race.”
Few readers would miss the newspaper’s sarcastic but subtle dig at the president. And as if to agree with it, on the same day the Daily Trust on Sunday whose stable no one can accuse of being an enemy of the president, published an editorial which clearly suggested it is unhappy with the speed of his governance.
“We urge President Muhammadu Buhari,” the newspaper said in concluding its editorial, “to immediately appoint an SGF (Secretary to the Federal Government), appoint a full complement of personal staff and nominate ministers without further delay.”
I agree with Trust that he should appoint the SGF and his full complement of personal staff without further delay. Indeed he should’ve done so from day one, especially as he has had close aides who possess the requisite skills, integrity and loyalty for the jobs and have done similar jobs for him long before he entered politics in 2003.
However, I disagree with the newspaper and those who share its sentiments that he ought to nominate members of his cabinet immediately. By implication, the president does need a cabinet to deliver on his promises. But nothing in the constitution says there is a deadline for constituting it. Of course, doing so should not take forever. At most it shouldn’t take more than his first hundred days in office.
In that case the man still has about two more months to go. If his current pace looks too slow to meet his 100-day covenant with Nigerians, I think it is because, as Nigerians, we seem too much given to drama. It is also because we underestimate the depth and scope of the mess which the hitherto ruling PDP had made of Nigeria in the last 16 years.
In the lead editorial of its June 20th edition, The Economist of London said Buhari’s coming to power is an opportunity for Nigeria as “Africa’s most important failure (to) at last come right.” In that same edition the newsmagazine carried a 16-page special report with the president’s picture on its cover captioned “Opportunity knocks” on how to get it right this time.
Opportunities like this come only once in a long while in the life of a nation. It is therefore better and safer for the president to err on the side of caution than rush into judgement and risk getting it all wrong. One hundred, even thirty, days may be too long to pick one’s closest aides but it is certainly not too long to put together a team competent and sincerely committed enough to do the heavy lifting that should turn this country around from the mess it is in.
And now to the Saraki controversy.
Sir,
Much as I share some aspects of your analysis on Saraki in The Nation of June 17, the last paragraph was off the track. In eight years, Saraki transformed Kwara in the areas of urban facelift, education, agriculture and roads.
Olatunde Ayodabo,
+2348033604983.
Sir,
You got it right when you said “Saraki served himself more than he served society.” You only forgot to add that he ruined Societe Generale Bank and the bank’s customers’ businesses. He has ruined so many things in Kwara. Now, who will deliver the 8th senate from being ruined by him? Only time will tell.
Leke Adeyemo
Ilorin.
+2348134616449.
Sir,
I don’t think it is fair to blame President Muhammadu Buhari on the recent election of Saraki and Dogara as President of the Senate and Speaker House of Representatives on the wrong assumption that he is the leader of the party. There is nowhere in the APC Constitution which says that the elected president or governor from the party shall be leaders of the party at national and state levels respectively. The constitution only says the president shall be a member of the National Executive committee and governors, members of state executive committee. Party chairmen are leaders of their party at all levels.
Secondly, APC senators and House members must learn to cooperate with PDP senators and House members for the smooth passage of their bills since they lack two third majorities in both chambers.
Hussaini Dangaladima,
Dan’iyan Zazzau Suleja
+2348163422383
Sir,
I read your piece of Wednesday, 17th June, 2015 titled “Saraki as President of the 8th Senate.” President Muhammadu Buhari at 72 cannot be wrong when he said he was not interested in whoever emerged as the principal officers in the two legislative houses. He said and did the right thing and should have been fully backed and supported by the party.
Instead, the party chieftains decided to act in their own wisdom but with what result? DISGRACE! They have since learnt the hard way and have been crying over spilt milk. They forgot the Yoruba adage which says that “Oroagba bi o se laaro, a se lale,” which means “The saying of an old man, if it does not come to pass in the morning will surely do in the evening”.
The strong man of Lagos politics should be told in plain language that this is politics at national level and not at state or regional level. APC should wake up. PDP is prowling around and roaring like a hungry lion looking for whom to devour. Let them put the episode behind, reflect on the lesson learnt and bounce back stronger.
Ologun B. Freeman,
Utako, Abuja.
Sir,
There should be no soft landing for Bukola Saraki. The best option for him is to resign. The decisions of the party hierarchies remain sacrosanct. He must be told in clear terms that Nigeria Federation is not Kwara State that his family members see as their patrimonial estate.
+2348073344775.
