By Ikechukwu Amaechi
President Muhammadu Buhari makes no pretense that he is not in a hurry, if ever, to walk away from narrow political alley or climb out of the dark ditch of provincialism into bright national light.
Even when his confederates befuddle the unwary by ingeniously clarifying what they know he didn’t mean to say, but which they claim he meant, he himself re-clarifies, for the avoidance of doubt, what he meant.
Buhari did exactly that on Tuesday, June 5, when a high-powered Abuja delegation paid him Sallah homage in the Villa.
The delegation, led by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, included former Imo State Governor, Rochas Okorocha; Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha; Chief of Staff, Abba Kyari; Chief of Defence Staff, General Abayomi Olonisakin; Chief of Army Staff, Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai; Chief of Naval Staff, Vice Admiral Ibok-Ete Ibas; and Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar.
Others included Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu; National Security Adviser, Babagana Monguno; Director-General of Department of State Service, Yusuf Magaji Bichi; Permanent Secretary, State House, Jalal Arabi; Senator Philip Aduda; former Communications Minister, Adebayo Shittu; and Central Bank of Nigeria Governor, Godwin Emefiele.
Buhari, who pleaded with the All Progressives Congress (APC) leaders and his supporters to stop complaining about his government to avoid making it unpopular, called Federal Capital Territory (FCT) residents “necessary evil.”
Why?
Because the majority of the FCT electorate voted for candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the last election.
The result declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) claimed that Buhari won majority votes in 19 states with a total 15,191,847 votes to defeat Atiku Abubakar of the PDP who garnered 11,262,978 and won majority votes in 17 states.
However, the most dramatic result came from Abuja, Nigeria’s seat of power.
There, Atiku polled 259,997 (61.33 per cent) to drub Buhari who got only 152,224 (35.91 per cent) in what ordinarily should be his political fortress.
Worse, Buhari lost in the polling booths in and around Aso Rock, a clear no confidence vote in him by FCT residents.
The message sank in and the Ramadan homage presented him an opportunity to vent his spleen. But that only reminded his visitors that Abuja residents preferred Atiku at the polls.
Buhari’s avowal that he really does not have any choice in protecting the seat of power because any negative thing that happens to it would also affect him betrayed his negative and anti-sportsman emotions when it comes to elections.
“I want to appreciate the number two man of the country because he knows what we are going through very quietly. I am very pleased that you came with this very powerful constituency,” he told Osinbajo.
“I appeal to you to remain exemplary so that those under you will know that the country is doing very well. If you break down and complain, the impact will reverberate all over and then, government will not be popular and whatever efforts we are making will not be appreciated.
“I have just spoken to the senator (Phillip Aduda) on my left and I told him that his constituency did not vote for me. So, I was very pleased that when they made the arrangement they put him very far away from me. I have all the results of all constituencies.
“I am not threatening FCT because to make FCT secure is to make myself secure and the vice president. I think they are necessary evil and that was why they decided to vote for PDP.”
Does it then mean that if his own personal security was not involved, Buhari would have threatened Abuja residents because they rejected him at the polls?
People dismiss this latest faux pas as a joke. But is it? I doubt! The Bible says in Matthew 12:34 that, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.”
Those who think that Buhari was being humorous may well remember his blooper during his visit to the United States when he spoke on security and counterterrorism in Nigeria and West Africa at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) on July 22, 2015.
Taking questions on the last of the four-day visit in a session moderated by former U.S. Undersecretary of State for African Affairs, Johnnie Carson, Buhari stunned his audience while responding to a question from Pauline Baker, President Emeritus of The Fund for Peace, who inquired about security in the Niger Delta, having been disappointed that the area never came up in Buhari’s discussions in Washington.
“My question relates to another area of Nigeria that hasn’t gotten a lot of attention during this trip and that is the Niger Delta. It’s a challenge that you are going to face.
“I wonder if you would tell us how you intend to approach it with particular reference to the amnesty, bunkering, and inclusive development,” Baker asked.
Buhari, who initially seemed out of depth with the term “inclusive development” riposted: “(Going by election results), constituencies that gave me 97 per cent cannot in all honesty be treated, on some issues, with constituencies that gave me 5 per cent. I think these are political realities.
“While certainly there will be justice for everybody the people who voted, and made their votes count, they must feel the government has appreciated the effort in putting the government in place. I think this is really fair ….”
And that was exactly what Buhari did in the four years of his first term.
While he was rewarding those who voted for him, so much so that his first task was to ask Jim Jong Kim, then President of the World Bank, to focus the bank’s intervention efforts in Nigeria in the “Northern region,” he at the same time claimed not to know what those who gave him 5 per cent vote really wanted.
For how long will Buhari continue on this cynical leadership trajectory? How can a president who claims to belong to everybody and nobody continue to allocate our collective values based on the quantum of votes he secured in different parts of the country?
So, if he and Osinbajo were not resident in Abuja and if the city was not the seat of power, the president wouldn’t have cared a hoot? It is the responsibility of the president to provide security for all parts of the country, irrespective of where he and the vice president reside or how Nigerians cast their votes.
Elections are over. This is time for governance and the entire country is the president’s constituency.
Just as the resources of the Nigerian state which he has been called upon to allocate do not belong to only those who voted for him, he has no right to exclude anyone or any section that rejected him at the ballot box.
In the 12 years Buhari contested for Aso Rock and failed, he garnered more votes in the North West than his opponents, yet former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan who beat him did not punish the region because they got fewer votes than him.
Calling Abuja residents “evil” because of their democratic choice is most unpresidential.
If that is a foretaste of what to expect during Buhari’s “Next Level” governance which has just kicked off, then Nigerians are, indeed, in for it.
