I have summarized Buhari's presidency in just a few words above. I have been away from my blog for the past two weeks, I will summarize the past three weeks and gauge Nigeria's political and economic temperature at the moment. I will write about Nigeria, the PDP, the APC, the National Assembly, states, the economy, about prominent ex-governors who are facing the long ambit of the law. I will access Buhari's 50 days in power. I will reflect on his July visit to the United States and lean into the next 100 days as much as I can. Nigeria is stuck in the mud, the ground seems slippery, those who voted change are questioning their belief and we are moving like those locomotive of the early years of transportation. Some former governors and their sons have been docked. Even the Lamidos were not spared. I am very sure that the president is keeping to his mantra of if we don't kill corruption, corruption will kill Nigeria. Subsequently, the president has been appointing those who will be the front-line vanguards of change, however, these appointments have been lopsided and began to alienate some sections of the country.
It is the prerogative of the president to sack and appoint any person to any political position.The onus lies on him to appoint competent people based on Federal Character principle as enshrined in the Nigerian constitution. Failing to do this is tantamount to preparing for failure and nepotism. Ethnic jingoism and nepotism is anti-progress. Just as Buharimeter reads 6.8 percent today, it might not pass 20% by 2019 cumulative and that is abysmal failure in all ramifications.
Hear President Buhari, “All of you, including the National Security Adviser, were chosen on merit,” “Your records gave you the job. “Save for the new Chief of Army Staff whom I briefly met at his Command at the Multi-National Joint Task Force, in Chad, I don’t know any of you. “Your records recommended you.” All the strategic security positions have been appointed except for Immigration, Road Safety and some other less strategic security positions. However in all these strategic appointments, two things are evident, either Buhari is punishing the South East for not having cast their votes for him or the Igbos have been proven right that they made the right choice, they pledged allegiance to the man GEJ who was the first president since after independence that gave Igbos unfettered access to positions of power which were hitherto denied to them. They thanked him with their votes. Where are the Buhari's supporters from the SE, if the president alludes that everyone he appointed are the best in their areas of defence, was there any transparent selection process which is devoid of discrimination and exhumes diversity and equality? The Igbos have been justified for voting in bloc for PDP. We are loyal people and we reciprocate good for good. I see no good coming from this nepotist and ethnically biased appointments. Buhari has proven Igbos right, he never liked us.
As for Buhari, he has the prerogative to appoint anyone but that prerogative right has checks and balances such as the Federal Character principle which is enshrined in the constitution and Buhari is under oath to uphold. Of all the strategic positions, Igbos who I can stand up anywhere in the world and state that we are intelligent like the Israelites and very advanced and can stand up to any tribe in Nigeria cannot produce one person who merits any of the positions and Buhari calls it merit, the kind of merit obtainable in the north! When Buhari was elected, he was elected the president of Nigeria and there is a moral burden on him to do what is right. As for me I am more interested in the development of Nigeria and the line Buhari is towing is anti-progress. He will destroy the gains we made in the last 6 years. I am very sure those that voted him want progress too. They may applaud the appointments because their people were included but they know its wrong. Buhari has always been predictable. It is only those who were clamouring for change that will be disappointed, as for some of us, what is happening now is not far from the expected. Old men don't forgive easily, it takes a statesman to overlook things and be truly nationalistic, as for Buhari's and his irredentist shenanigans, they should have a field day, Nigerians asked for it. Here it comes!
Buhari's inability to appoint ministers is a function of internal crisis in APC. It is ignominy to defend the indefensible. The state of the nation which is currently like a rudderless ship tossed about by challenges of BH, economic instability, epileptic power supply, fuel shortages to name but a few demands urgent attention as canvassed by Buhari and his irredentist shenanigans. The man has not even laid down his agenda more than 50 days after getting to office, going by his slow pace, 4 years is not enough to achieve 20% of his proposed plans if he has any other than wild goose chase after Jonathan's government. His model of one man presidential system of government is doomed to fail from start. Femi said they won't probe far into the past so that the Mafia will not come after them. Look at how nonsensical Buhari has become, instead of counting the gains of his administration, one cannot point to any single tangible achievement given the rhetoric of broom wielding change slogan chanters over the past 51 days while our man has become a globe trotter who is bent on enjoying his twilight days on presidential visits which he was denied by IBB and his henchmen in the past. That is why he wished he was president at a younger age. Much of Buhari's dreams is to achieve his personal goals and not to develop this country, else the passion to develop this country would have been visible in numerous documents detailing and marshalling out development agendas for the country.
Buhari's disposition is a reflection of his party's ideology. No wonder one man wanted to impose a senate president and speaker on the country. They are power mongers. Their plan is not to develop Nigeria. All they want is power, else with the allegiance and support Saraki, Dogbara,Ekweremdu and Yusuf have pledged to Buhari, APC has nothing to worry about. Because of selfish interest and self aggrandizing attitude of some destructive elements in APC who want all the positions after relying on nPDP support, that is why it seems that water has one under bridge. However, reality has dawn on them, how could these shenanigans just use nPDP and dump them, these people are unbelievable, if they cannot share power and arrogate all the power to themselves, how will they develop Nigeria, maybe they are the only people who have the magic wand to turn things around as Buhari is doing currently when things are going from bad to worse.
Nigeria as it is today is in a state of chaos. The new president has spent 50 days in office and there isn't yet direction on which way we are heading. From the NASS assembly crisis to lull in the economy, increase in prices of food to the free fall of the Naira which is above N230 to $1, about 16 appointments which has ethnic and tribal sentiments hovering over it to no ministers appointed yet, the president penchant for travelling and lack of any policy direction that Buhari intends to rescue Nigeria with. In fact, the country is degenerating to total anarchy in security, economy, development and national unity. The only saving grace for the Buhari government is the enormous goodwill which he enjoys from the citizens. In his Eid el-Fitr address to Nigeria, the president has begged for patience, as paraphrased by Premium Times, he said, " Forget my slow pace, I’m working hard, planning meticulously, to fix Nigeria." As the president heads to the United States on Monday 20th July to meet with Obama and members of the US government with his 32 team entourage who are neither official members of his government, Nigerians are being suffocated with patience. They have been patient for over 50 days and they are expected to be have more resilience.
Meanwhile the DSS in gestapo style raids have been having a field day, they went after the immediate National Security Adviser detaining him under house arrest for a few days and stating that their arrest had to do with protecting the nation from the former NSA chief, "based on ‘credible intelligence’ linking him with alleged plans to commit treasonable felony against the state." The chief security officer to former GEJ was not spared. While I am not interested in the allegations because the people involved have refuted the claims and the truth will soon be in the open, these kind of undemocratic acts should not be sanctioned by a 'converted democrat'.
The wild and unsubstantiated claims that ammunition was found in the house of an NSA chief is indeed laughable. As an ex-NSA chief, what else do they want the man to possess? His house should be full of computers like me who is an IT guy or foodstuff or books or what? So this early, because of Buhari's tribal posture, he is scared that a populist backed gang-up can boot him from power, so it means he knows that he's wasted the first 50 days in office and has perpetuated nepotism, irredentist ideology and ethnic jingoism. These are enough reasons for Buhari to be afraid of been sacked prematurely from Aso Rock.
What the president's men and the president himself keeps telling us is that he never met the service chiefs and I ask, does the president need to have met the service chiefs? How many people does he know in Nigeria in person or in the military? So no one lobbied for these positions for these people, tell your stories to the birds. Three words to describe Buhari's presidency so far nepotism, irredentist ideology and ethnic jingoism. So in this country where the Igbo states continue to maintain the top positions in educational achievements in all spheres of human life, Buhari's merit system did not find them worthy of his distribution of positions.It is like China and Russia rating world universities and leaving out the Ivy league schools and the likes of Oxford and Cambridge and saying categorically that merit was used.
The very reasons why many Nigerians were averse to Buhari's presidency are all beginning to emerge. The man's dictatorial tendencies are all very visible, his nepotist posture is gaining tractions, his appointments so far has exacerbated the call for session of Biafra, his lack of knowledge about economic development has left Nigeria in a quagmire, investors are wary of the Nigerian economy which they so enthusiastically waited for given the successful and peaceful transition of power. Like a ship tossed by waves, Nigeria is heading for the rocks.
