Critics and admirers assess activities of President Muhammadu Buhari’s first 100 days in office, Editor, Politics/Features, EMEKA ALEX DURU, reports.
On February 6, in the build-up to the general elections, Muhammadu Buhari, then the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), took a trip to Maiduguri, Borno State capital, in what many likened to hunting in a lion’s den – a risky gamble of sorts. And the party had its reasons.
Maiduguri and other towns in Borno and by extension, the entire North East, were then in a near state of war, on account of Boko Haram insurgency. Many security agents deployed to quell the menace had clearly been overwhelmed by the terrorists. Thus, when the retired General embarked on the trip, it appeared a suicidal mission of sorts. “Was this not the Maiduguri that even the residents were leaving in droves?” concerned Nigerians and party members had wondered.
But the APC flag-bearer was not deterred. In fact, to the surprise of many, the turn-out by his supporters was tumultuous. And the security agents stationed at the Maiduguri Stadium were overwhelmed.
Reports had it that at a point, the apparently exasperated soldiers and policemen were forced to shoot into the air and release some canisters of tear gas in a failed attempt to keep the crowd at bay.
That, incidentally, did not work. Rather, as Buhari’s motorcade snaked into the ecstatic crowd, it became more difficult to maintain order. The crowd went wild when Buhari had to walk through the elevated isle of the mega podium.
“Fans went out of control as they broke through the iron barricade that fenced them out and rushed towards the stand. The friendly show of support and love for the APC presidential candidate suddenly became a threat, as all pleas for them to calm down fell on deaf ears. Sensing that it would amount to a waste of time if he should insist on speaking, Buhari took the advice of his aides and quickly allowed them to whisk him out of the venue,” a reporter who covered the event, wrote in a national newspaper, Leadership.
That was the Buhari phenomenon – a mystique that saw him beating an incumbent, President Goodluck Jonathan, in the March 28, 2015 presidential election; a feat that many agreed was quite uncommon in the country’s political history.
The Buhari magic, of course, did not come as a surprise to perceptive analysts. In his first outing as Military Head of State, through a coup d’etat in 1984, the former army officer left a mark on Nigerians that has, somehow, remained indelible. Coming on board at a time the nation had bled profusely on account of corruption, dwindling ethical values and badly managed economy, he had approached governance with anger.
Thirty years after his ouster in what was seen as a palace coup by his Army Chief, General Ibrahim Babangida, and after three unsuccessful attempts at the presidency, Buhari still nursed the idea of putting Nigeria on the path of purposeful governance. He also spoke on his determination to stamp out corruption from the system and restore Nigeria to a pride of place among the comity of nations.
Coming at a time that Nigerians had become disgusted with the obviously derailed Jonathan’s administration, Buhari’s message resonated among the youth and the elderly that had borne the brunt of misrule in the last 16 years of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)-supervised government.
APC and roadmap to fix Nigeria
Riding on the crest of the momentum engineered by the Buhari persona, APC, which had advertised itself as a better alternative to PDP, presented Nigerians an enchanting blueprint of governance which it christened ‘Roadmap to fix Nigeria’.
In what it presented as a 10-point agenda for a new Nigeria, the party listed areas it would focus on to make life meaningful if elected.
Highlights of the presentation included job creation; anti-corruption crusade; free, relevant quality education; agriculture; housing plan; and healthcare plan for children and adults.
The party also listed social welfare scheme for the less-advantaged as well as road, power plant construction, among its priorities, adding that it would strengthen peace, security and foreign policy.
The roadmap read in part: “Roughly, one in four Nigerians and half of young job-seekers are unable to find work. The number of people whose jobs do not cover the cost of food and housing is even greater.
“In addition, major industries that pay higher wages account for just over five per cent of the economy. The lack of jobs is the most critical challenge facing Nigeria today, hurting every community and preventing us from being the truly vibrant and prosperous nation we deserve. Building a diverse economy that allows every Nigerian to earn a living and better care for his or her family is our number one priority.”
Its antidote for unemployment includes immediate creation of 20,000 jobs per state for those with a minimum qualification of O’level (WAEC, GCE, etc) certificate and who participate in technology and vocational training. There is also the idea of establishing technology/industrial estates fully equipped with information and communications technology (ICT), power and other support across the country to attract and encourage small-scale technology businesses and other entrepreneurs.
The party also unfolded an elaborate agenda against official and/or private sector corruption. Part of its strategies in this regard, it said, would be to strengthen legal provisions to prevent stay of proceedings and other delays in corruption trials. It also vowed to “guarantee the independence of anti-corruption and financial crime agencies by legislation, linking their budgets directly to the Consolidated Revenue Fund”.
Regarding security challenges facing the nation, the APC said it would allow states to own local police forces. It promised to establish a serious crime squad to fight terrorism.
Coming at a time the nation’s scorecard in governance, fight against crime and corruption was not cheering, the intervention by APC was instantly celebrated by the party’s sympathisers as offering a window of hope for the obviously traumatised ordinary Nigerian.
A fresh beginning
Buhari built on the roadmap and gave PDP a push that resulted in its exit from Aso Rock State House.
At his inauguration on May 29, he assured Nigerians that their confidence in him was not misplaced.
“Nigerians will not regret that they have entrusted national responsibility to us. We must not succumb to hopelessness and defeatism. We can fix our problems,” Buhari enthused.
He sealed his speech with an exciting pledge that he belonged to all and to none in particular. That particular commitment threw Nigerians at home and abroad into wild ululation.
One hundred days after Buhari’s inauguration and his historic speech, Nigerians are divided on the impact of his administration on the polity.
Buhari scores self high
The president, incidentally, scores his administration high in bringing true change to Nigerians as he promised during his campaign, assuring that the transformation the country had undergone in the last three months of his leadership was not a fluke.
Buhari, who spoke through his Media Adviser, Femi Adesina, last Wednesday, told members of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), who came calling in Abuja, that he was doing everything to secure the future of the country, especially that of the youth, by ensuring that the culture of corruption was totally eradicated in the nation.
“We are totally committed to building a country where our youths can realise their full potential. You can be assured that your welfare and well-being are topmost in our minds, and very soon you will see the things we have promised come to fruition,” he said.
Senior Special Assistant (Media) to the President, Garba Shehu, had earlier in a piece, ‘Understanding Buhari in 100 Days’, thrown light on some of the activities of the administration that indicated that he had not lost touch with his commitment at repositioning the country.
“President Buhari has given the job his best shot and the whole country is saying that we never had it so good. He has re-instituted the values of hard work and administrative efficiency,” Shehu wrote.
He added that the president has, within the period, taken relations with Nigeria’s immediate neighbours to new heights, adding that by their open admissions, the countries did not have someone they could talk to on the deteriorating security situation in the Lake Chad Basin area, in Aso Rock, before now.
Shehu stated that in the area of economic management, Nigerians are already seeing things happen that they thought were not possible in so short a time.
According to him, “He (Buhari) didn’t put a kobo to finance the power sector. Yet, reading his body language alone and knowing that there are things you cannot do and get away with under Buhari, electricity supply all over the country has risen to unprecedented heights”.
Nigerians react
Aside key officials of the government, there are other Nigerians that insist that Buhari’s first 100 days had not been a waste.
Port Harcourt-based Public Administration teacher, Dr. Emmanuel Anichebe, in an encounter with TheNiche, maintained that the steps taken by the president in his first 100 days in office, especially at the diplomatic front, has boosted the external relations profile of the country.
He also listed moving the central military command to the North East in the fight against insurgency as a bold move by the administration.
Anichebe equally enthused at the increasing rapport between Nigeria, United Kingdom and United States of America (U.S.) which has seen the two powerful countries relaxing their lukewarm policy on Boko Haram to promising not only in helping in fighting the insurgents but also in partnering Nigeria in the war against corruption by assisting to get back stolen funds stashed abroad.
In similar vein, Edy William, former Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) Youth Leader and publisher of Port Harcourt-based Envoy newspaper, said he had no problems with Buhari’s steps so far, pointing out that the president had started the journey of four years well in its first 100 days.
Williams said that Buhari’s choice of appointees and direction of his appointments were guided by historical experience.
“Buhari learned lessons from President Goodluck Jonathan’s ugly experiences. Jonathan picked people he hardly understood and was too eager to satisfy ethnic balance and in the process assembled a clan of selfish political office holders that rather betrayed him and worked only for themselves,” he emphasised.
But Lagos lawyer and chieftain of Aka-Ikenga, Igbo intellectual think-tank, Oscar Onwudiwe, is hardly excited at the agenda and course of the Buhari administration, three months after its inauguration. In an exchange with TheNiche, he painted the government in a picture of an entity that is yet to define its vision and mission.
He said, “It is not in doubt that the president is still on honeymoon (in the words of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu). However, interpretations to his ‘no policy direction’ differ. Some make excuses for him and say 100 days is too short to judge; that the man met the type of mess no head of state ever met.
“I find that laughable, particularly as it’s coming from a party that claimed they had the magic to change the fortunes of Nigeria, and a man who had 12 years to plan, fine tune his plan and wait for his opportunity.
“To my mind, the president did not expect to win. He is so unprepared, plus the fact that democratic governance is not in resonance with his person and training. The conflict is what we are seeing.
“His mission in office is yet to be clear. What is clear is the hunger to try certain people and create fear all over the land, since he cannot inspire anyone.
“CBN foreign exchange policies change every day, yet the country is import-dependent. The system that breeds corruption remains intact, while we are told that fear of Buhari would melt corruption away. Optimism has left me”.
Ondo State PDP Director of Publicity, Ayo Fadaka, agrees with Onwudiwe. In fact, to him, Buhari in 100 days has shown that he lacks what it takes to move the country to the next level. The administration, he says, lacks focus.
According to Fadaka, “the Buhari government can be likened to a kite that is consistently refusing to fly. As far as I am concerned, it continues to fail to justify its mandate. One would have expected that a man who had doggedly pursued the ambition to become president for many years would have hit the ground running. But what do we have? A president under whose guidance Boko Haram that had been chased by Goodluck Jonathan administration outside our borders now operates blatantly not only within our borders, but in our cities!
“When ex-President Jonathan was visiting the neighbouring countries to set up an alliance against Boko Haram, the APC criticised him endlessly, calling him ‘clueless’ but what has Buhari done? Exactly the same thing!
“The Buhari government has consistently failed to make petrol available to Nigerians. It continues to display its lackluster performance and incompetence in this regard. Where is the ‘change’ they so flippantly promised?
“The only visible agenda it seems to have now is the corruption battle and we wait to see how it will be implemented. We want to see who will be tried for corruption and who the sacred cows will be. We are waiting and watching!
“Finally, I must say that a government is propelled by policies it propounds. And as we speak, Buhari’s government has not propounded any policy to guide its actions. So we only have a vacuous government in place now. God will save Nigeria.”
Other Nigerians have varying opinions on the performance of the Buhari administration in its first 100 days.
For Professor Olusola Adeyeye, who represents Osun Central Senatorial District in the National Assembly, the president’s first 100 days in office are commendable.
In his words, “The 100 days of Buhari in office are commendable and something to write home about. Whether 100 days or not, he has been following all his electoral promises which he made during his campaign. As a citizen of Nigeria, I have no regret seeing him as Nigeria’s president.
“Buhari is a person that I have been following his activities since he ruled Nigeria. Apart from that, the confidence I have in Buhari cannot be quantified.”
PDP chieftain and former Transport Minister, Ebenezer Babatope, however, does not have opinion on Buhari’s first 100 days. He is yet to forgive him for clamping him and other politicians into detention during his first coming as Military Head of State.
“I am not interested in anything Buhari and his performance in 100 days, to be sincere with you. I can never like Buhari. It will be very difficult for me to pat that gentleman on the back because he nearly destroyed me and destroyed my life. Many people have told me, ‘you are a Christian, forget about it’. Yes, I am a Christian, but I believe in the Mosaic Law: a tooth for a tooth, an eye for an eye. I will never have wished for Buhari to win back power with what he did to us.
“I spent 21 months of my life in Buhari’s jail. He put me in Kirikiri Prison, Jos Prison and Yola Prison, and then the man now is coming back. Honestly, I have always said this; it is a pity. I pity myself. If I had money, I would rather avoid the gentleman; I would go abroad.”
But for erstwhile senator and chairman of Presidential Advisory Committee (PAC) on 2014 National Conference, Femi Okunroumu, the president has not performed badly but needs to buckle up in some areas in order to attain the dream of fixing the country.
He said: “So far so good. Buhari’s administration is not different from that of his predecessors, knowing fully that Buhari is a military man. Military man will always be a military man. When Buhari ruled this same Nigeria as Head of State, as a student of history, we knew what happened concerning his achievements. Though no one is perfect, in this dispensation, he needs to buckle up on the security of the entire nation which is more paramount to me. On his anti-corruption moves, I can give him pass mark, but he has a lot of work to do in order to take Nigeria to greater heights.
Renowned entrepreneur, Mrs. Alaba Lawson, would rather set agenda for the president on improving the lot of the womenfolk as he clocks 100 days in office. She seeks increased involvement of women in the scheme of things. She also lauded the president for concentrating on the job before him and not making too much noise.
“One thing I notice in Buhari is that he is not loud. But his body language is enough for us to know where his going,” she said.
Curiously, PDP national leadership, which undoubtedly is the greatest loser following the enthronement of APC and Buhari government, was, by last week, undecided on its verdict on the president in the last three months.
In an invitation on the party’s National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, to comment on Buhari’s first 100 days in office, he simply wrote, “We have not yet decided on any official response.” Analysts described the obviously languid response as an outright lethargy on the path of the opposition party that is supposed to be putting the government on its toes.