At last, President Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan has answered the call of Nigerians to seek re-election.
Before his formal declaration in Abuja on Tuesday, November 11 to take another shot at the presidency next year, many groups (never mind if they were sponsored by the government and its agencies) had been junketing around the country sensitising men and women to persuade Jonathan to run again.
The promoters of Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria (TAN), for instance, were so strategic in their mode of advertising and seeking endorsement for him that they even collected signatures.
They claimed that 2.3 million signed in the South East to support Jonathan, South West (2.6 million), South South (6.05 million), North Central (1.85 million), North East (1.6 million), and North West (3.4 million).
That brings to 17.8 million the total number of Nigerians whom TAN claimed endorsed him for another term of four years. That was how the foundation for his declaration rally was laid.
Before then, the road to the day Jonathan answered the call by “Nigerians” to present himself for a second term was not smooth at all.
Prior to the tolling of the bell for his endorsement, some chieftains of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) insisted that he was not qualified for another term. Their argument was that he pledged to serve one term and allow power to return to the North and that he has not performed to the expectation of citizens.
Those who insisted that Jonathan must leave office in 2015 include Governors Sule Lamido (Jigawa), Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu (Niger) and Rabiu Kwankwazo (Kano), who was then in the PDP.
One man vehemently opposed to Jonathan’s return bid is former President Olusegun Obasanjo, also of PDP. And instances abound when PDP members went to court seeking to stop Jonathan from re-election.
Outside the PDP, the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), before it merged with other parties into the All Progressives Congress (APC), did not see any reason for Jonathan to seek another tenure because of the level of poverty, insecurity, unemployment, corruption, impunity, infrastructure decay, among other factors.
The APC has sustained the argument of a lack of good governance under Jonathan and thinks he does not have the capacity to handle national challenges, particularly Boko Haram, whose members have held the country hostage for nearly five years.
I congratulate Jonathan, not because I am better off under his presidency, but for having the courage to weather all the storms that tended to put a wedge on his right to seek re-election as contained in the Constitution.
Watching him delivering his speech, one would think all the problems of the country have been solved going by what he told the world, but we know that is not the situation on the ground.
Youth unemployment is still very high. Electricity supply, the fulcrum of his campaign in 2011, has not improved to the level of jump starting the economy despite the privatisation of the power sector. The roads have not been fixed to give Nigerians the sense of belonging they crave.
Nigerians still find it difficult to feed once a day despite that the recent rebasing of the economy places her on top of others in Africa. Security of life and property, the primary objective of every government, is not guaranteed because of the Boko Haram menace.
However, Jonathan used the acceptance rally to reaffirm his covenant with Nigerians and wasted no time in raising hopes of a better tomorrow.
He acknowledged that his government has not won the war against graft and pledged to “eliminate corruption and poverty” if given the opportunity to govern Nigeria for another four years.
“We must protect our country. We must save our people. I will do everything humanly possible to end this criminal violence in our nation,” Jonathan told his audience, apparently referring to the recent attack at Government Science Secondary School, Potiskum, Yobe State where a Boko Haram suicide bomber left more than 40 students dead on the eve of the day he sought re-election .
“Many Nigerians have lost their lives and property to these mindless killings. A number of young men and women have been kidnapped by these criminal elements, including our daughters from Chibok. We will free our daughters and defeat terrorism,” Jonathan reiterated.
Many Nigerians, including politicians who belong to the opposition political parties, will tell you that Jonathan is a nice person. But they also reason that statecraft is too serious to be sacrificed on the slab of merely being a good or nice man.
And I agree with them, if the acknowledgement made by Jonathan which bother on truth is anything to go by.
Take for instance his acknowledgement on corruption, poverty and failure of the state to secure the lives and property of citizens.
A president with this kind of mindset would have found reason to put off his re-election rally to honour the students cut down in their prime by the insurgents, but will his thought agree with that of his handlers, which is where the anomaly has always been?
While watching news of the killing of the students in Pokistum on Channels Television on Monday, November 10, my six-year old daughter asked: “Daddy, why did the president allow Boko Haram to kill people?”
I was not only shocked over the tricky question, but it dawned on me that the activities of the insurgents now live in the consciousness of both adult and young Nigerians. A sluggish okay I got from her after explaining that Jonathan was looking for Boko Haram members to send them to jail summed up the little girl’s mindset.
Whatever made Jonathan to go ahead with the declaration rally a day after more than 40 future leaders of the country were murdered has put a big minus on the milk of human sympathy I thought flowed in him.
If there was a time to prove bootlickers wrong, it was that Tuesday he declared for re-election. He would have shocked everybody had he postponed the rally for another day in deference to our fallen future leaders.
Postponing the rally to mourn the murdered students would not have removed anything from Mr. President, instead, it would have endeared him to the hearts of millions of Nigerians, including those who have not endorsed him.
His popularity rating today would have put him in a position to have Nigerians venerate him. But, again, his handlers bungled it.
I can imagine the number of unsolicited votes Jonathan would have garnered next year had he made that sacrifice for the people. But as usual, he did not take the opportunity or rather, his handlers made him not to, because they were looking at how much would come to them in naira and kobo from the bazaar, not how it would benefit the man of the moment, the president.
Had Jonathan postponed the rally for the sake of those boys, the same mammoth crowd that graced it on Tuesday would have attended still, if not double, because one good turn from a caring leader will deserve another from the led.
