With a pliant party leadership, subservient Senate and lukewarm House of Representatives at his disposal, Tinubu is running riot and not looking back in his march at maximum rulership. This is why the country is being tailored at one-party state. Incidentally, previous outspoken critics and activists have been cornered and compromised. It is such bad that at public functions, the President’s campaign slogan: “On your mandate we shall stand”, is fast taking the place of the National Anthem. This is the level Nigeria has fallen to. The question should therefore be; ‘is this the democracy we fought for’. It is certainly not.
By Emeka Alex Duru
You may not entirely blame those that snigger that Nigeria’s democracy is on life support. In a way, they are in order. What we have at hand in the name of democracy is not real, properly speaking but a weird version that is completely different from that which Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, defined as the government of the people, for the people, by the people. Forget the flowing gowns and other funny attires by the present players, the system at hand is more of civilian autocracy and absolutely contrary to what Nigerians had in mind while battling the military out of the political space.
At the onset of the current dispensation, the people, old and young, had hoped for an arrangement that would give them voice in the administration of the country; one that would restore their dignity after years of assault and humiliation by the military. They had looked forward to a situation that would accord them freedom as guaranteed by the constitution and an atmosphere that would allow them unleash their latent energies to the development of the nation.
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Unfortunately, after 27 years of unbroken democracy practice, the entire hopes and aspirations are vanishing. In place of prosperity, Nigerians have been thrown into unmitigated poverty, to the point of a whopping 63 percent of the population experiencing multidimensional poverty, according to statistics by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). Instead of deepening democracy with its encompassing principles of rule of law, freedom of association and multi-party politics, the system is shrinking and yielding to anarchy, rule of the thumb and absurd gravitation to one-party state. Rather than men and women cultured in the nuances of democracy being in charge, buccaneers have literally taken over, turning the land into personal estates where their dispositions determine how far the people can operate.
In the process, cronyism, propaganda, blackmail and outright coercion are being promoted over the cardinal ethos of democracy that manifest in robust debates, persuasive encounters and active engagements. Because the government of the day lacks the content and capacity to deliver, it resorts to intimidation. Those that are considered as opposing voices and likely obstacles in the agenda at power retention, are destroyed or destabilized. More than any other evidence, the show of shame by the agents of the state against the opposition political parties, indicates the extent of pettiness and intolerance on the part of the government against individuals and groups with alternative viewpoints.
As it stands, the three main opposition political parties, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Labour Party (LP) and African Democratic Congress (ADC), are enmeshed in leadership crises that have imprints of the presidency and ruling All progressives Congress (APC). In the rabid desire to be returned for a second term in 2027, President Bola Tinubu and his foot soldiers, are doing everything to ensure that the opposition is utterly frustrated or obliterated. When charlatans and hirelings therefore prance about and cause confusions in the parties, Nigerians are not fooled by their antics. The people know who are propping and prompting them. It all points to a government not having much to showcase in performance profile but wanting to be returned for another term. It also shows the extent intellectual engagements and robust debates have gone down in our politics.
In the Second Republic of 1979, I was not of voting age. But by 1983, I had attained the electoral age. Within that period, it was common for us, youths to visit the Enyimba Stadium, Aba, Abia State or Orlu Township Stadium, Imo state, to listen to politicians on campaigns, articulating and marshalling out their points alongside their party manifestoes. It was quite exciting hearing Nnamdi Azikiwe (Zik) of the Nigerian Peoples Party (NPP), Obafemi Awolowo (Awo) of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), Aminu Kano of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), Waziri Ibrahim of the Great Nigerian Peoples Party (GNPP), Shehu Shagari of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), speak of their agenda for the country and how they intended to go about such. Their lieutenants – Chuba Okadigbo, Ibrahim Tahir, Nnia Nwodo, Patrick Dele-Cole, Ebenezer Babatope, Melie Chukelu Kafundu (MCK) Ajuluchukwu, amplified the programmes and blueprints of the parties to the people. It was an era defined by elevated jibes at opponents and expression of wits. Supremacy of the party was the order of the day. Of course, the then President Shagari knew his limits in relating with the National Assembly.
Sadly, that period is gone. With the coming of President Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999, a pattern that aimed at eroding party discipline and democracy guardrails was enthroned. The legislature suffered massive debasement and judiciary heavily assaulted. At Obasanjo’s machination, the Senate had five presidents in quick succession. That trend at trampling on the legislature continued with his successors. But at no time were the institutions of the state reduced to a ridiculous state as in the current Tinubu administration.
With a pliant party leadership, subservient Senate and lukewarm House of Representatives at his disposal, Tinubu is running riot and not looking back in his march at maximum rulership. This is why the country is being tailored at one-party state. Incidentally, previous outspoken critics and activists have been cornered and compromised. It is such bad that at public functions, the President’s campaign slogan: “On your mandate we shall stand”, is fast taking the place of the National Anthem. This is the level Nigeria has fallen to. The question should therefore be; ‘is this the democracy we fought for’. It is certainly not.
What we have is an aberration, a caricature of what democracy is. The observation by the ADC National Chairman and former Senate President David Mark, that Nigeria’s democracy is under growing strain and must be defended, thus, becomes germane. It is not about the PDP, LP, ADC and the plot to destabilize them. It is rather about the future of democracy in the land. This is the time for men and women of goodwill to rise and halt the impending drift.
The nearest the country came to this troubling point was during Obasanjo’s misguided attempt at tenue elongation, when patriotic forces in the National Assembly teamed up and promptly terminated the project. The uncertainties ahead 2027 are pointing to that ominous direction. Tinubu should not be allowed to have his way. The opposition must be allowed to thrive. Democracy should be allowed to grow.
