Politics in Nigeria has become a tournament of race horses where the game is on the side of brute speed and not administrative wit. Politicians come with quick fix templates to buy into the psyche of some simple-minded electorates often razzle-dazzle by pecuniary sentiments to satisfy cleavage agenda or tokenistic incentives, albeit temporal. Mercantile politicians have weighed in on the perspective of many Nigerians to sell dummies for the price of the real deal. Caught in the mix of the new trend, victorious political platforms have used power at their disposal to make their predecessors mere statistics.
It is therefor on the auspicious occasion of the former governor of Niger state, Dr. Mua’azu Babangida Aliyu’s 62nd birthday that I reflect on how time slide so fast leaving only memories behind and bringing ambitions closer. How accidental political situation makes politicians like Aliyu political statistics, remembered only when the meal of blackmail is to be served. The statistical value of the likes of Dr. Aliyu at federal and state levels helps the ruling APC to showcase their skewed fight against corruption, which at the end exposes their hypocrisy. Sadly, it gives them air of satisfaction to drag political opponents on excuse of fighting corruption, which pretty much shields them from their own acts of corruption, mal-administration and poverty of emotional intelligence.
It is on record that Dr. Aliyu was chairman Northern States Governors Forum (NSGF) for eight years at the most trying time of the region security challenge. It was the forum that articulated linkage with United States, which culminated in loans to combat terror, education deficit and humanitarian problems in the region. It was Aliyu led NSGF that partnered with United States Peace Institute to contain Boko Haram insurgency. Under his leadership the forum fought to unravel sponsors of the terror organization, he was also the first to insist that the armed forces had no political will to fight Boko Haram. Yet such a man is being forced to be a mere statistic when it would benefit the country more to groom him for higher national call?
It may be recalled that Dr. Aliyu advocated for one Nigeria when he insisted indigineship be open for all Nigerian citizens regardless of state of origin. He made sure spread of appointments was with merit across the state and extended political appointments beyond to carry along non-indigenes to buttress his ethno-religious harmony and resourcefulness. He fought against spread of Boko Haram from the Mokwa axis of the state despite condemnation from some ethnic jingoist. He stemmed the tide of Fulani Herders. He acted like a man who has seen the future. Now all he stood for agitates the continued existence of Nigeria from the center under the present administration.
The 2015 defeat of the PDP may have happened partly on corruption, impunity of the party but the ruthlessness, impunity that greeted the victorious against the vanquished diminished respect most people would have had for the ruling APC – especially as the ruling party visited impunity on their perceived or real political rivals, while they engage full throttle swimming in corruption, nepotism, mal-administration, cluelessness. The list of thieving government officials under the present “change” administration is endless at state and federal levels yet most of them are protected. It was until public outcry, which recently forced Mr. president to officially sack former SGF Babachir Lawal and the former DG NIA, Ayo Oke. Many soiled politicians mostly from PDP are on lease with the APC, occupying sensitive positions and operating comfortably.
Granted the PDP led itself into a political disaster in 2015, also granted that many leaders in the party deserve what came at them, not all were lacking in moral values. It is therefor sad to see that sin of a few is visited on others, lumping them to fill the appetite of vendetta and vassal seeking politicians elected not on their merit but on account of their political luck to be in the APC at the right time. In fact some electorates just thumb printed without bothering to know the candidate behind the broom, realizing their mistake pretty late. That mistake is indeed having negative turn on economy of our dear country as most politicians elected under the APC platforms are largely political neophytes.
Blaming elites alone in the put down syndrome against politicians defeated in the 2015 election may not present the entire picture. Many brainwashed electorates cheered most time when they were supposed to call their leaders to order in what has become a political purge against the opposition. Impunity is indeed legalized under the APC just the way it was when the Tsar Nicholas II and his family were liquidated in 1918 under the Vladimir Lenin led revolution in Russia. By simply pointing at a PDP member and the allegation is without doubt and the accused must be punished by hanging. Sadly, the political temperature may never be the same again, as the wind is blowing no one any good. Those who sponsored stoning of PDP politicians in 2015 only thought Nigerians the art and science of stoning. Interestingly, APC politicians are being pelted for the crime they alleged against PDP politicians.
The likes of former Governor Aliyu deserve more than mere political statistics of politicians in the dragnet of the EFCC. They deserve better than an early political grave. The administrative gaps, corruption, skewed anti-corruption fight, cluelessness, and vendetta exhibited by most of the elected or selected politicians on the platform of the APC only show’s how unprepared, sadistic and retrogressive they are. They have no right to smear their predecessors because they are largely in competition with their peers over who whittled the opposition the most at states of local governments levels, rather than taking back what was stashed. Today they have the power,tomorrow may be their turn at the receiving end of impunity.
Written by Israel Ebije, the Chief Press Secretary to former Gov Aliyu.
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