FEATURE ARTICLE

Temple Chima UbochiSaturday, October 8, 2016
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Bonn, Germany

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OLD AGE SEEMS TO CONFER DISHONESTY INSTEAD OF WISDOM OR SAPIENCY IN NIGERIA

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If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything (Mark Twain)

I love agitation and investigation and glory in defending unpopular truth against popular error (James A. Garfield)

No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which one is true (Nathaniel Hawthorne)

n event this week showed the deceitful tendencies of some Nigerians, who are called "Elder statesmen". It was during the public presentation of a book, "Muhammadu Buhari: The Challenges of Leadership in Nigeria", written by one Prof. John Paden, an American author. How can an American know Buhari better, more than Nigerians, as to write a book about him? I learnt that he always twist facts by writing about people he knows nothing about. His book on Sarduana of Sokoto was also a crap. No matter how long the American has stayed in Nigeria, or whatever special interest he has in the developments in Nigeria, including its economic and political affairs, he's still a novice, a "gold digger", and can't tell many Nigerians, who know the real Buhari, who our clueless president is. It's just like a Nigerian, telling the Americans more about President Obama, or a Nigerian writing more about Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor (Prime minister), than the real Germans. Everything about the so called book written by Prof. John Paden is fraught with deception.

Fani Kayode, according to Whistler, wrote that Professor John Paden, President Muhammadu Buhari's official biographer, is a man that is very comfortable with distorting the truth and telling lies. He is also a man that has been doing so for virtually all his adult life. Anyone that doubts that should read his biography on the late Sir Ahmadu Bello, which was written in 1986 and titled "Ahmadu Bello, Sarduana of Sokoto: Values and Leadership In Nigeria", and which is essentially a self-serving and comprehensive compilation of Bello's numerous virtues with little or no mention of his many vices. It was, at best, a beautiful public relations job for Bello and, at worse, a compilation of disjointed verbiage fit only for the dustbin. Paden's book on Buhari falls into the same category. It is nothing but an illusion: an extraordinary and fantastic fairy-tale built on a shady foundation of pseudo-intellectual clap-trap and garbage. To him, President Buhari is infallible. He is, at best, an angel of light and, at worst, a perfect mortal with no warts. Paden's latest contribution is the greatest exercise in dishonesty and historical revisionism that has ever been undertaken by any foreign or Nigerian historian since independence. Writing rubbish seems to be Paden's stock in trade.

My problem with the book presentation here is on what the so called Eminent Nigerians, who graced the occasion with their presence, said. I thought that old age and experience do confer on people uprightness and the ability to say and stand for the truth, no matter what. The old people of Nigeria are supposed to be telling the truth, so that the younger generation would learn from them. But in Nigeria, it seems that the older ones take lying as a passion, even more than the younger ones. General Yakubu Gowon and Olusegun Obasanjo, who have ruled this country, and should be telling the truth now, although they made so many mistakes and lied a lot during their tenure, are still lying and deceiving Nigerians at their age and experience. That's why things will never get well in the country, until there's a moral rebirth, starting from the top to the bottom. If you place a lie detector on Gowon, Obasanjo, Buhari, Tinubu or on any of the other so called eminent Nigerians, the detector will catch fire, as the instrument will not be able to withstand the kind of lies each of these so called leaders or elder statesmen has churned out. That's a shame!

What am I talking about? Gowon, who was the chairman of the occasion, during the presentation of Buhari's book, described Buhari as a fighter and a man of destiny working to get things right with the economy despite the huge challenges being faced by the country. In his words: "As a combat politician, he fought to take over the Presidential Villa despite being told he would never see it."

Can Gowon please tell us who told Buhari that he will never see the Presidential villa again? Gowon should know that President Buhari is not a man of destiny; he is doing nothing to get the economy right, and rather, he has driven the economy into a recession. President Buhari didn't merit the office of the President of Nigeria, if not for the help from President Obama and the west. I know that Gowon wanted to say nice things, as the Chairman of the occasion, but at his age and level, he shouldn't have given a damn, and should have let the chips fall where they may. Nigerians are suffering, and he went there deceiving himself, thinking that he was deceiving Nigerians. Is he not seeing what's going on in the country? Is Gowon not living among the people? Is Gowon not seeing what the Fulani herdsmen did to his own Plateau State, and their onslaught now in Benue State and all over the country? Not too long ago, Gowon stated that he will throw his weight behind current calls for the restructuring of the Nigeria, if the process will keep the country united. Is Nigeria moving in the right direction for Gowon to start now contemplating accepting the condition he rejected about 50 years ago (the Aburi Accord); is Buhari leading well for Gowon to agree to accept now what should have saved the lives of about 3 million Nigerians, mostly people of the old eastern region, who were exterminated during the senseless war the restructuring of Nigeria then should have avoided?

Obasanjo, during the presentation of the book, was more evasive than Gowon, and didn't want to commit himself much, when he said that though the book confirmed what he knew about Buhari, but that it did not represent a definitive assessment of the president. My problem here is that Obasanjo, for the fact that he made the mistake of supporting Buhari, during the election, has not been truthful. He says one thing now and another few seconds later, as such that no one can pinpoint exactly where he stands on any issue. That shouldn't be the mark of a man of his age and experience. If President Buhari is doing well, why then did Obasanjo say that Nigeria is fractured now more than ever before; why did he ask President Muhammadu Buhari, in March 2016, to stop using dwindling crude prices for lack of performance. I know many read where Obasanjo told President Buhari, then, that he met worse condition when he took power in 1999, but made the best of it. Obasanjo said that he met a paltry $3.7 billion, in the coffers, but that Goodluck Jonathan left behind a whooping $30 billion for President Buhari. In his words: "When I assumed office in 1999, I inherited $3.7 billion in reserve, while Buhari met $30 billion, almost 10 times of what I met then, and the price of oil then was $9. When it got to $20, I was dancing. Know the price is down now and with time, it will jump up again."

Reviewing the Buhari's book, during the presentation, the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Ahmed Tinubu, waved off critics of Buhari's governance style, declaring that the president is on an assignment against time, to undo the wrongs of nearly two decades of bad governance in the country. Look who was talking. Look how deceitful Nigerian leaders can be: The Afrivibes, on September 27, 2016, reported that (I hope Tinubu will not deny this) "Tinubu Bombs Buhari, says "You Didn't Merit to be President, and I Regret Making you the President!" It wrote that while regretting building APC and giving Buhari a platform to become president, Tinubu said: "We all knew he didn't merit to be president, but you know how we politicians behave when we are desperate for electoral position; we beg. That was how President Buhari always and frequently came to my private house here in Ikoyi with his entourage which included that Nasiru and others. At a point, he "Buhari" was practically living in my house, under my roof. The room he was sleeping was just 6-7 steps from my own private room. I was building his confidence because he didn't have it. He was even scared of Atiku and Rabiu. What I ate, he ate. My security was his security because he expressed fears about the security provided by the Jonathan government. He was afraid of Jonathan".

I also know that Tinubu wasted his time trying to say nice things about Buhari in public, as there's no love lost between them - they have mutual hatred for each other. The federal government has just decided to drop forgery charges against the senate president, Saraki, and his deputy, Ike Ekweremadu, but will continue the prosecuting of the clerk of the national assembly and his senate counterpart - just a case of setting the culprits free and punishing only the accomplices. The move by Buhari, it has been alleged, was to checkmate Tinubu. The Whistler reported that "There are indications that emerging political realities might have informed the federal government's move to withdraw the forgery charge against Senate President Bukola Saraki, and his deputy, Ike Ekweremadu. The Whistler learnt from close Presidency sources that the rift between one of All Progressives Congress national leaders, Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, might have informed the rapprochement between President Buhari and the duo of Saraki and Ekweremadu."This is all about power play. President Buhari has his eyes fixed on 2019. With the fallout with Tinubu, there is need for him to bridge gaps, and dropping the forgery case is one smart move as Saraki, in particular, will be beholden to the president".

On Thursday, October 6, Aliyu Umar, counsel to the federal government, asked the federal high court in Abuja to amend the charge, dropping Saraki and Ekweremadu from the charge, but Salisu Maikasuwa and Benedict Efeturi, former clerk to the National Assembly and clerk of the Senate, respectively, would face prosecution. Tinubu had fallen out with the national leadership of the APC, calling for the resignation of Chief John Oyegun over his alleged tweaking of the Ondo State governorship primary of the party which saw to Tinubu's anointed, Segun Abraham, losing out to Rotimi Akeredolu. The war between Buhari and Tinubu has deepened following claims by the president's biographer, John Paden, that Tinubu placed himself above Yemi Osinbajo for the vice presidential slot, a claim Tunji Bello, an aide of the former Lagos state governor has denied".

Former U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria, John Campbell, who also reviewed the book, impressed many, when he said that America should be more interested in the politics of Nigeria. In his words: "America has not shown enough interest in investing in Nigeria". In other words, it's not enough for America to help a clueless man to become the president of Nigeria, it should also be held responsible for the excruciating hardship in Nigeria. President Buhari is begging America to start buying Nigerian crude oil again, but America should not oblige, as that will provide him and his co-looters more money to steal. If they want to steal, let them work for it, through other avenues, by diversifying the Nigerian economy, and then at least, some Nigerians will gain something from that, even if through the picking of the crumbs falling from the looters tables.

The man of the day, during the book presentation, was Prof. Ibrahim Gambari, a former Nigerian Representative at the United Nations, who said it as it was supposed to be, without fear or favor, by urging Buhari to show leadership and carry all Nigerians along in piloting the affairs of the country. We learnt that whiling asking Buhari to bringing immediate change to the thousands of his supporters who voted for him during the elections, he also specifically advised Buhari to practice politics of inclusion, warning that development without unity would be tough.

The problem we have in Nigeria is that many have taken deceit as passion. I still don't see the reason why many will be praising Buhari, who has merited the Nobel Prize for cluelessness (assuming such an award exists), to the high heaven. The most painful aspect of it is that the most gullible people are some of the educated ones who should have known better. I wonder why some Nigerians "are crying more than the bereaved": if President Buhari's own daughter can deplore her father's leadership style, why should some Nigerians, far off, be defending who or what they don't know? A website, loudng.com, wrote that "in what appears like a show of public disapproval of her father's style of rulership of Nigeria, one of the president's daughters, Zahra Buhari, took to her twitter handle on the 30th September, the eve of October 1st, 2016, being the 56th anniversary of Independence in Nigeria, and stated that she was sad that her father, President Muhammadu Buhari, has being ruling Nigeria using the "trial and error" approach. The President's daughter's tweeter post read; Zahra Buhari (@Zahra_Buhari):

#Nigeria At 56 and my dad is still using 'trial and error' in ruling the country. This makes me feel so sad.

The website concluded that "This post by the daughter of the president sort of confirmed claims by opposition politicians that the All Progressive Congress (APC) federal government, lead by President Buhari, lacks the know-how to take Nigeria to the promised land, as they promised in their campaign of change during the elections in 2015. It would be observed that since President Buhari got into office in 2015, the economy has continued to crumble: The US dollar that used to exchange for N197, before the coming of the Buhari's administration, now exchanges for nearly N500 to the dollar, with the Euro and Pounds Sterling now exchanging shamefully for much higher amounts to the Naira. Prices of every know commodity has more than tripled, even as more companies continue to close down and more Nigerians getting thrown back into the unemployment market daily"

The change you asked for. Isn't it?

TIT BITS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkI-B2JWSZI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eOuK-pYhy4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IN_Lv04enPw

THE THANX IS ALL YOURS!

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