Saturday September 5 was exactly 100 days Nigerians got another leader in the person of former military dictator, President Muhammadu Buhari, who took the oath of office on May 29.
In so short a period, the good, the bad and the ugly have happened.
While his economic policies are uncertain, blame game, bickering, and inordinate ambition by All Progressive Congress (APC) chieftains have characterised these 100 days.
From the inauguration of the eight National Assembly (NASS) on June 6 to the few appointments Buhari has made, the outcome is cacophonous. Some Nigerians question if this is the change they crave.
Buhari has delayed the appointment of ministers, the NASS has sat for only a few days and gone on break for several weeks.
He has made at least 31 political (and economic) appointments in a country of about 170 million people divided into 36 states and six zones. Of the 31 appointees, 24 are from the North and seven from the South.
The South East, a critical segment of Nigeria and one of the major legs on which the country stands, has had no person appointed by Buhari.
Many, including the Convener of the Coalition of Northern Politicians, Academics, Professionals and Businessmen, Junaid Mohammed; and the President of Nigeria Bar Association (NBA), Augustine Alegeh; have tried to rationalise the appointments.
I challenge them to read again the oath of office Buhari took in line with the Constitution: “… that I will not allow my personal interest to influence my official conduct or my personal decision; that I will to the best of my ability preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria … that in all circumstances, I will do right to all manner of people, according to law, without fear or favour, affection or ill-will.”
Recently, former Governor of Anambra State, Chukwuemeka Ezeife, said the Igbo have not been treated fairly in the governance of Nigeria.
He argued that Buhari’s appointment of Ibe Kachikwu, who hails from the Igbo-speaking part of Delta State, to head the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), is not enough to satisfy the South East.
But Mohammed, in his usual way of dishing out hate comment like one suffering from diarrhea of the conscience, ended up insulting the whole Igbo.
He said it is wrong to reward the Igbo simply on the basis of the Civil War, which lasted 30 months between 1967 and 1970.
Mohammed thundered: “If it is about Buhari making the appointments based on merit, I have no problems with it. I don’t believe Buhari or Nigeria owes any Igbo anything.
“I don’t care what Ezeife says; if they had seceded, there would have been no Nigeria today. As people who acted outside the interest of Nigeria as a country, to expect compensation is a very odd logic.
“If the Igbo don’t like it, they can attempt secession again. If they do, they must be prepared to live with the consequences. Nobody owes them anything and nobody is out to compensate them for anything.”
With the latest appointments made by Buhari, need we say that he is taking directives from characters like Mohammed who do not see anything good from any other part of the country except the North, nay Hausa/Fulani?
What manner of an elder statesman would advise the president to retain the petroleum and defence ministries’ offices knowing what the Constitution says on political appointments?
If Mohammed and his ilk have forgotten, let me refresh their fast retarding brain.
Section 147 (3) of the Constitution says: “The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to reflect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also to command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that Government or in any of its agencies.”
If Buhari and his kinsmen like Mohammed are aware of this constitutional provision on political appointments and they bother little about the backlash, how else can one be described as an ethnic irredentist or jingoist?
Part of the reasons many Nigerians said they never believed in Buhari’s presidency is because they do not see him as one who would want to govern Nigeria from where he does not appear.
Many see him as an unrepentant ethnic bigot whose new found love in democratic governance will do nothing to change his traditional belief. Unfortunately, the way he is going about his appointments points to a leader who believes in himself alone, a godlike potentate.
Those like myself who stuck to Buhari because of the aura of incorruptibility woven around him by his handlers are seeing through the deceit that is Nigeria’s political leadership regardless of party affiliation.
I said in this column before that this government is determined to undermine the Igbo nation. Many Igbo have also realised that, hence they are not surprised by Buhari’s appointments.
The plot started from the NASS and we know the undercurrent that led to the ostracisation of Igbo lawmakers from the leadership of the Upper and Lower Chambers. Even the credible manner Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, emerged was greeted with the stiffest criticism from quarters that see nothing good in Ndigbo.
When Buhari was confronted about what he told Christiane Amanpour on CNN that he would pay more attention to the areas that gave him 97 per cent of the votes with which he defeated former President Goodluck Jonathan, he twisted the meaning, reiterating he is the president of all Nigerians.
A hundred days on, his conscience will tell him whether he is allowing his personal interest to influence his official conduct or his personal decision with the appointments he has made so far.
A hundred days on, Buhari knows whether to the best of his ability he is preserving, protecting and defending the Constitution.
He also knows after 100 days if in all circumstances, he is doing right to all manner of people, according to law, without fear or favour, affection or ill-will as he told Nigerians on May 29 when he took the oath of office.
Those who delude themselves that the appointments Buhari has made were his personal staff know the truth but the coward in them would not allow them say it.
Their views are tantamount to saying that those he wants to appoint on merit can only come from one part of the country, and this time, the North. Until Nigerians appreciate the full essence of true federalism, this contraption we practise will not work.
I was disappointed by the argument of Alegeh on Channels Television a fortnight ago that Nigerians should wait until Buhari has finished making his political appointments.
Of course we are waiting.
I get scared when men who ought to speak up do so in hush tones on behalf of institutions that should be the last hope of the common man.
That is also why I am not excited in the recent submission of APC National Chairman, John Odegie-Oyegun, that his party will be more involved in future federal government appointments after all the blunder.
And you ask yourself, which other appointments?
Igbo leaders in the APC should retreat. The child they had gone to circumcise is dead.