“And on the economy, rather than pursue clannish interests by ordering the NNPC to expedite action in prospecting crude oil in the North, Buhari should instead refocus himself and invest the recovered looted funds in scientific agric programmes, across the geo-political zones.”
The School Feeding Programme just recently launched by the Federal Government of Nigeria, is probably the finest hour of this administration, which seem to have forgotten almost immediately after winning election, that it rode to victory on the highway of progressive values.
If truth be told, we all knew President Muhammadu Buhari didn’t showcase the credentials of a Harvard Business School Scholar. His personage didn’t radiate the charm of a Barack Obama, neither did he pretend to be endowed with the oratory of a certain Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe.
Yet, long before his electoral campaigns began in 2015, we already knew him as the Spartan general who introduced War Against Indiscipline (WAI) as military dictator. He remained stoic in prison, where his ironically humane captors dumped him not knowing where else to cool-off a damned audacious soldier. And many could witness that he had been an austere man in and out of office, and so the campaign of calumny about his days in PTF, did not catch-on. An agreeable portrait of a patriot, isn’t it?
In spite of this high moral scorecard, there was a huddle, only huge cash could help him scale-through: presidential campaigns and election, especially in Nigeria; is not so much about issues, as it is about cash.
So expediency drove a thitherto austere Buhari into the unholy and choking embrace of the perceivably most corrupt elements in Nigeria. The very henchmen his anti-corruption crusade should sweep away. And so did a near righteous man come to live under a moral burden, and as a legal axiom roars “he who comes to equity, must come with clean hands.”
Then I ask Nigeria: Is there an exit point from this quagmire, with limited collateral damage, for the president; that will also save APC from lingering distrust and opprobrium by a huge section of the Nigerian polity? I think so! How?
President Buhari to clean up a bloody nose, needs to shun complicated and uneducated policies sold to him by APC and begin to do three simple and workable things:
Learn to show compassion, be seen as tolerant and pursue domesticated values. How?
While jettisoning what former president Goodluck Jonathan didn’t do right, by condoning primitive corruption, President Buhari can learn from him how to connect emotionally with ordinary folks, by creating his own catch-line that can resonate like Jonathan ‘s,” when I was growing up, my parents could not afford shoes for me to go to school, ” or like Jonathan, shed humane tears off-guard, at the scene of a plane crash.
He should refrain from using the word “crush” in dealing with groups agitating for causes he considers unpatriotic but rather sound more conciliatory and fatherly, because the polity is long over-hitting, and he can hardly afford to fight many battles with lean resources. He should find time, now that he has recuperated, to read The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Green, whether he likes to read or not; to understand that one of the laws of power, is to learn how to pick and limit your battles, so that you don’t dissipate energy and material wealth unnecessarily.
Finally, he should domesticate his value system by looking inwardly, to make the British think that Lagos is more cosmopolitan than London, by travelling less and allowing our foreign missions earn their pay cheque. In fact, a foreign specialist doctor, could have been flown to Aso Rock Clinic, if our own doctors can’t be trusted, rather than wasting alleged Six Million Pound Sterling, to make a bold and patriotic statement, as former president Jonathan made recently in London, when he declared: I am a proud citizen of Nigeria.
On the salient but explosive fellers that seem to be enduring pervasively-that he is using his fronts men to sponsor Sharia Law into our Federal Constitution, that is inherently secular, he should like Babangida refuse to become the catalyst of the last and most effective instrument to decimate the Nigerian promising enterprise. Be doubly warned, “Mr. Intergrity”
And on the economy, rather than pursue clannish interests by ordering the NNPC to expedite action in prospecting crude oil in the North, Buhari should instead refocus himself and invest the recovered looted funds in scientific agric programmes, across the geo-political zones.
If you heed this clarion call, you will reclaim lost grounds, begin to do well and then live the rest to history to judge after your Stewardship. Remember, you are already in the court of history. Even some Christians like us are praying for God to properly direct you!!
• This writer of this piece is the Editor-in-Chief of Education Townhall (online and hard copy editions)