Assistant Politics Editor, DANIEL KANU, writes on the issues and intrigues behind President Muhammadu Buhari’s appointment of service chiefs.
Not many were actually surprised when service chiefs and the National Security Adviser (NSA) who served under former President Goodluck Jonathan were relieved of their duties on Monday, July 13, by President Muhammadu Buhari. In their places, the president appointed new ones.
The appointments, which came 43 days into the inauguration of the current administration, were expected to inject fresh blood into the system and re-tool the strategies in enhancing the nation’s security.
Under the new dispensation, Major-General Abayomi Gabriel Olonishakin is the new Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), replacing Air Chief Marshal Alex Sabundu Badeh; Major-Gen. Tukur Yusuf Buratai takes over from Lt.-Gen. Kenneth Minimah as Chief of Army Staff (COAS); Rear Admiral Ibok-Ete Ekwe Ibas replaces Vice Admiral Usman Jibrin as Chief of Naval Staff (CNS).
Also named were: Air Vice Marshal Sadique Abubakar as Chief of Air Staff (CAS), replacing Air Marshal Adesola Amosu; Air Vice Marshal Monday Riku Morgan as Chief of Defence Intelligence (CDI) and Major-General Babagana Monguno (rtd.) National Security Adviser (NSA), taking over from Col. Mohammed Sambo Dasuki (rtd.).
Their appointments will be in acting capacity until confirmed by the Senate, the president told the new men.
“Legally, you are in acting capacity until the National Assembly accepts you. It is only then that you will take the oath of office. Thereafter, we will sit down and talk in more detail,” Buhari told the new service chiefs.
The Nigerian Army Act 2004 provides that service chiefs should be confirmed by the Senate. It does not say the CDS should be included.
Interpreting an emerging pattern
The recent appointment has continued to elicit apprehension despite excuses from the presidency that the Buhari-led government does not seem to care about sectional sentiment.
Critics have, for instance, noted that out of the six security appointments, four are from the North, while only two are from the South.
The new exercise added weight to earlier criticisms that trailed the appointments made by Buhari which many argued were lopsided in favour of his Northern region of birth. The president has, however, dismissed insinuations that he was implementing any Northern agenda in his appointments.
Buhari, since taking over the reins on May 29, has, so far, made not less than 17 critical appointments, out of which perhaps only three came outside the North.
Although some people considered some of the earlier appointments as not “juicy”, many Nigerians have condemned its alleged lopsidedness, saying they were signs of what to expect from the Buhari presidency.
Among the earlier appointments are: Acting Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Mrs. Amina Bala Zakari; Director, the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), Mordecai Danteni Baba Ladan; and Accountant-General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris.
Others are the State House Chief of Protocol, Lawal Abdullahi Kazaure; Aide De Camp (ADC), Lt.-Col. Mohammed Lawal Abubakar; Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu; Head, Transition Committee, Ahmed Joda; Secretary Transition Committee, Adamu Adamu; Director-General, DSS, Lawal Daura; Chief Security Officer, Abdulrahman Mani; and Senior Special Adviser Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina. Curiously, no appointments had been extended to the South Eastern part of the country. Many thus accuse the president of acting out an agenda against some sections of the country.
But speaking in defence of the presidency, Adesina refuted the claims that Buhari was acting a Northern script against the rest of the zones in the country.
He said: “The president received a national mandate and was going to pursue it as such. The president does not have a Northern agenda. He has a national agenda. He got a national mandate and that is the way he is going to exercise that mandate. I have already said it and I still maintain that.”
Public affairs commentator, Emmanuel Asiwe, said Buhari should not be insensitive of national sentiment in his appointments, as it may send wrong signal which may not represent his genuine motive.
According to Asiwe: “The former DSS Director General, Ekpenyong deserved his sack for having turned such a highly delicate and professional agency into a political tool of a governing party. But in appointing his successor, the president should have been well advised to be political about it – i.e. being sensitive to the national sentiments and sensitivities.
“Since he wanted to appoint Musa Daura, who is eminently qualified, and Daura being from his hometown, and having already appointed two previous officers (Accountant General and INEC) both from the North West part of the country, the president should have appointed at least one Southerner in another agency along with Daura for the purpose of national politics.
“Though the president may mean well in his actions, he needs not give his vast political opponents the data to paint him in bad light as a regional irredentist. Such a perception, rightly or wrongly, is not good for the president’s political image.”
Agenda for service chiefs
According to Section 14 of the 1999 Constitution, “the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government”.
The present security challenge in the country, it has been argued, should top the task for the new service chiefs, given the unrelenting Boko Haram assault on Nigerians.
Kidnapping, armed robbery and oil theft are also serious issues that Nigerians expect them to be on top of the task.
Nigerians are anxiously waiting for the president and the security chiefs to take other far-reaching steps, particularly to halt the resurgent wave of terrorism. So far, the activities of the terrorists are doing unquantifiable damage to the country.
A final solution to the Boko Haram menace seemed in sight in those six weeks after the postponement of the 2015 general elections from February 14 to March 28. Unsavoury as it was, the postponement witnessed a new impetus on the part of the armed forces who took the fight to the terrorists with a gusto that pleasantly surprised even government’s critics.
At the height of the onslaught, the terrorists’ bases which seemed out of the reach of the military began to fall. The notorious Sambisa forest was combed, and the terrorists’ hideouts razed. The offensive saw the liberation of several towns, and the rescue of hundreds of citizens who had been held captive by the terrorists. So significant were the gains that the talk in town began to focus on Buhari merely coming in to mop things up. Nigerians were already writing the obituary of Boko Haram. The tragedy, however, is that Boko Haram with a renewed fiendish resolve has resumed doing what it knows best, with impunity and deadly efficiency.
Going to seven weeks after Buhari took over, the murderous Boko Haram sect has killed an estimated 800 people in a renewed orgy of violence. From the killing fields in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states, the terrorists have widened their areas of operation and changed tactics from pitched confrontation with security forces and control of swathes of Nigerian territory, to the use of teenage girls as suicide bombers against soft targets. Quite clearly, Boko Haram seems to have become more daring, many fear.
This, to majority of Nigerians, is unacceptable as it contradicts the yearning of Nigerians for change that the All Progressives Congress (APC) promised. Given that the president was fully aware of the dire situation and indeed expressed his firm resolve to defeat Boko Haram, political observers are of the opinion that it is not unreasonable to expect that the killings would have at least been contained. Regrettably, this has not been the case; and this Nigerians believe is a huge embarrassment to Buhari.
Commentators are in agreement that, going forward, Buhari and his security chiefs should set measurable benchmarks with respect to the war on terror. Buhari, they opined, ought to have understood that, unlike other areas which may accommodate delays and deferred action, security does not have that luxury.
In their submission, Nigerian lives are being lost on a daily basis and it is time for a decisive approach by the president and his security team.
Besides, the relocation of the operational command and control centre from Abuja to Maiduguri, the new grand strategy, to critics, has remained amorphous. In the short term, Buhari’s shuttle diplomacy to forge regional and international collaboration against Boko Haram is said to be commendable.
The Buhari public perception
The appointment of new security chiefs appear to have provided temporary relief from the increasingly widespread perception that Buhari has not taken off with a bang as expected, or has not hit the ground running.
This is because moving close to the end of his second month in office, his core team is not yet in place.
In one of his pre-inauguration interviews, Buhari said he had an idea or a list of his key appointees already, but would rather keep it in his chest. Critics say that if that sounded defensible prior to inauguration, it no longer does, more than a month after.
Also in a recent interview with Arise TV, the president said he was not in a hurry to appoint ministers. This is contrary to the views of most political commentators that if he is not in a hurry, the country is.
Buhari’s reputation, military background, and utterances during his campaigns gave Nigerians reason to believe that, finally, a man who appreciated the nature and the seriousness of the Nigerian problem and how to tackle it had come. But so far, expectation from most Nigerians appear to be dimming.
Ohanaeze Ndigbo faults appointments
The youth wing of the foremost pan-Igbo organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, has condemned the appointments so far made by Buhari, urging him to carry every section of the country along.
The group, which operates under the aegis of Ohanaeze Youth Council (OYC), said it is peeved by what it described as some sectional appointments so far made by the president, stressing that appointments should be spread among the six geo- political zones of the country.
In a statement signed by the National President of OYC, Okechukwu Isiguzoro, the group further said for the president to have so far appointed majorly people from only one part of the country is against the principle of federalism.
Part of the statement read: “We are worried at the manner of appointments so far made by President Muhammadu Buhari which has so far been concentrated in the North. We wish to remind our president that there are well qualified and trustworthy Nigerians in every geo-political zone. We hope President Buhari is not acting out a script. The earlier he allays fears of other Nigerians about the manner of appointments, the better for the nation.
But constitutional lawyer and human rights advocate, Tunji Abayomi, said the few appointments made by the president were not enough to determine his disposition.
He told TheNiche that it’s too early to assume that Buhari is playing a script, urging Nigerians to wait for other appointments before making conclusion.
Said Abayomi: “The few appointments made out of the thousands remaining cannot be a basis to judge the disposition of President Buhari. In my view, it’s not a problem. There are still more appointments to come. Let’s wait first before we jump into a wrong conclusion.”
Buhari rode to power on a chariot of promises. He vowed to curb corruption, tackle insecurity, and rescue the economy. All these resonated with most Nigerians, and it gave him an edge over an incumbent and secured him a historic win. However, from the little that has happened in the first six weeks, it is difficult to say Buhari will or will not deliver on his campaign promises.
The most memorable line from his inaugural speech remains “I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody”. What it then means, according to observers, is that Buhari must carry all zones along if he must succeed. Critics are yet to see him acting in that respect.
