This article tries to do two things; to diagnose what has gone on so far with Nigeria and to provide a prognosis of the future.
Nigeria has been sick for a while and the future looked/looks bleak. The immediate challenge was the accidental presidency of Goodluck Ebele Jonathan who was hoisted on Nigerian by a scheming President Obasanjo, who did not want to leave office; but wanted to control the country using a remote control. The first remote was a sick President Yar’ Adua who upon election showed signs of independence from the “smart manipulator.” But since he was sick and often at the care of doctors, the split between the god father and godson was not obvious. The master manipulator of course had a backup plan, a supposedly weak Vice President GEJ. After the expected death of Yar’ Adua the backup ascended the high office to face two intractable challenges. The Islamic North did not like the idea that a Christian Southerner should be following a Christian Southerner. PDP’s constitution had called for a Northerner/Southerner rotation and the ascension of GEJ altered this gentleman’s agreement. They started planning GEJ’s downfall.
President Obasanjo, though of ethnic Yoruba origin, was not beloved by the Yoruba as one of theirs, if fact they most likely saw him as an Igbo and dearly wanted “their own man.” Meanwhile both the SW and North perceived GEJ as a surrogate for the SS and SE territories. The lines were drawn according to Nigeria’s fault lines of the pre and post-independence of East/West/North. Each side amassed forces ready to do battle. Some of the members of the ruling PDP looked ahead and reviewed the post GEJ world. Some saw no future for them in the post GEJ world and moved over to those plotting the overthrow of GEJ. Their luck shined as the opponents of GEJ welcomed them with cheers but without trying to decipher their motivation. The unifying force for the new APC which was formed was “anybody but Jonathan.” Each believed that the “anybody” was him. The current mess is trying to find who that “anybody” is.
The fight to find out who “anybody” is has led to fist fights in the Senate and in the House. It has led to handcuffing of the previously identified “anybody” President Muhammadu Buhari who cannot articulate his vision and a legislature which cannot meet without physical fights. It has led to the complete collapse of the collapsing naira in forex exchanges; to some Nigerians wondering if there was really a smooth transition after all; to a newly emboldened insurgency; to fair-weather friendships and alliances and a lot more. Some people are asking “Is APC he that is to come or look we for another?”
This is not anything new in Nigeria. Nigeria has always been at the brink. They go close; take a look and retreat. Nigeria will retreat as it had done in the period before independence when the North was not ready for independence and some in the South wanted to go without them but retreated and waited; as it did in 1966 when Lt. Col Gowon believed that “there was no basis for unity” but retreated; as it did in 1967 when Biafrans left and was forced back; and as it did many other countless number of times; some epic and some not so loud.
Nigeria will once again go the brink; take a look and retreat.
The prognosis is that there will be a One Nigeria before the end of the year. There will be a group of One Nigerians working as the Executive, another group working as Senators, and another group working in the House. It will be an unintended Unity Government. All led by the amalgam of APC/PDP men and women: sometimes in conflict at times in peace but moving the country’s agenda forward until 2019 when another attempt to define Nigeria would be attempted, pretty much with the same results.
Rome was not built in a day.
Those who are looking for a breakup will be disappointed just as those who are looking for a one united state.
Perhaps by 2114, if the world still exist, a one United Nigeria would emerge.
At that time this author would be at the right hand of God judging the world and Nigerians as will be most of his readers.
Written by Benjamin Obiajulu Aduba.
