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Alhaji Abubakar Rimi may mean well for NdiIgbo |
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ANNOUNCE THIS VIEWPOINT TO YOUR FRIENDS! |
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Let's face it. It was a calculation that was bound to backfire from the get go. The invitation of Alhaji Abubakar Rimi to the just concluded World Igbo Congress convention in Dallas on the face value made no sense. But truly speaking, Alhaji Rimi of Kano may mean well. He is a true Igbo friend and I will explain. He and Solomon Doushep Lar of Plateau state are some of the best friends Ndiigbo could ever get from the north. Let's start with Solomon Lar. He it was who supervised the management of African Continental Bank and the assets of Ndiigbo left there in Nigeria while we prosecuted the Biafran war. He it was who was at the helm of affairs of ACB when the war ended. His tenure ran well into the early seventies and coincided with the period Nigeria was economically destabilizing the defeated Igbo. But it was to Lar's credit that he invited Ndiigbo to come get soft loans from the Bank to rehabilitate them and revive their businesses. He also husbanded the little assets left in the bank by Ndiigbo to the extent that most Ndiigbo who had money left in the ACB account received commensurate interests. (Ndiigbo, I am sad to announce that ACB died after its management was handed over to our people.) When it was time to return Nigeria to civilian democracy in the second Republic, Lar, a respected leader from the Middle belt teamed up with other middle belters who mainly are Christians and saw life from Igbo socio-economic and political prisms to support the Nigeria Peoples Party NPP led by the Right Honorable Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe. The NPP was the only party then that reflected Ikemba Nnewi's position today as captured in Rudolf Okonkwo's beautifully written piece that "It is better to be a majority in a minority party than a minority in a majority party." How time changes. It is instructive that the same Ojukwu who is preaching this new song teamed up with core Ndi Ugwu's Shagari's regime ostensibly to hasten the reintegration of Ndiigbo into the main stream of Nigerian politics. Time they say is the healer of wounds and may be Ojukwu is finally coming home. How soon we forget good deeds done to us by others. It is important to note that while some prominent Ndiigbo like Alex Ekwueme, Chuba Okadigbo had a policy of reintegrating Ndiigbo into the MAIN STREAM of Nigeria politics, Solomon Lar and people like Abubakar Rimi (I will come to Rimi in a moment) said a stout NO to the oligarchic North. For that Rimi was ostracized. Solomon Lar defied convention, irritated his northern overlords, joined the NPP, won its governorship in Plateau in the north and his state became the contiguous model for Niger and Benue states. Nigerian political pundits believe that if the 1983 elections had been free and fair, NPP because of Lar's influence in Plateau would have won Niger and Benue hands down and that in that scenario we would have been spared the Buhari, Babangida, Shonekan and Abacha brou haha. Forget the fact that Alhaji Rimi was against Alex Ekwueme during the now better-forgotten Jos Convention. Forget that that convention also anointed Aremu Obasanjo against the wishes of most Igbo who wanted Alex Ekwueme to win. Alhaji Rimi, is to be fair, a friend of Ndiigbo. He was the first Northerner under the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP) to enact laws that effectively liberated women. He led by example. When it was unpopular to do so in the Muslim dominated Northern Nigeria, he asked his wife to remove her veil to show the example to other northern women in Puddah. His adult literacy campaigns in Kano State were sited by the United Nations. During his reign in Kano, Kano state achieved over ninety percent in adult literacy. He said NO to the core North and initiated the gospel of change '83, which became adopted as the NPP official slogan for the 1983 electioneering campaigns. This slogan heard throughout the land, helped to succinctly put NPP's message across and almost effectively emasculated the Sokoto Fulani stranglehold on the lives of Northern Nigerian citizenry. He collaborated with such Northern hot heads as Bala Usman of Ahmadu Bello University Zaria to question the decadent status quo in the north. He was a first class iconoclast. A Hausa Bokwei who questioned the Fulani hegemony over his people, he adopted the NPP (an Igbo dominant party) as his party when he was thrown out of the PRP for rebellion. He won in that elections hands down but was robbed by the intimidating Shagari's NPN bandwagon. While in the Government House Kano, he cultivated friendship with moderates and intellectuals. Most of the from across east of the Niger River. He sided with the down trodden and enjoyed a wide acceptance from the people of the south. Particularly with Ndiigbo. He became a friend to the ZIKs , the Nwobodos and the Mbakwes and embraced their brand of politics, which angered the core North and earned him expulsion and disdain from the PRP. His people - the talakawas loved him to the core. He was not corrupt. He was more forward looking and far sighted than say Governor Mbakwe when he (Mbakwe) was still good. I was not at the Jos Convention and so could not testify to what happened. I have this hunch though: that what must have happened was a political payback time to Ogbuefi Alex Ekwueme from Nwobodo, Lar and Rimi. You needed to have been in the Nigeria of the 1983 elections to appreciate where these trio came from. Folks, one simple question I have always asked those who say Nwobodo or Lar or Rimi made Ekwueme lose in Jos is: Given the climate of politics in Nigeria then, and the backing that the core north and the military establishment gave to Obasanjo, are we sure Ekwueme stood any chance? Is it not strange that in spite of the lack of support, which Obasanjo got from his Yoruba people, he still went ahead to win. Who has ever seen that type of miracle in modern politics. Like George W. Bushing losing in Texas while winning at the national level. Or a Bill Clinton losing Arkansas while winning at the national level. My friends, Nigerian politics have been known to defy any known logics and standard and tested political permutations. "In politics you do not have permanent enemies but permanent interests," so says the axiom. I have this feeling that what you saw in Dallas was not a Rimi spying for Obasonjo or for the core north for that matter. What you are seeing is an Igbo dominant party in the embryo stage. See who was there. Iwuanayawu, Emeka Ojukwu, Orji Kalu (he offered to host the next gathering) Abubakar Rimi. Rimi knows that the north is dissatisfied with Obasanjo. Rimi knows that Nigerians will not tolerate a northerner soon after Obasanjo. Rimi is still interested in big league politics in Nigeria. Rimi wants to be on the vanguard that will re-enact the failed NPP-PRP-UPN merger of 1983. In 2003, (if Nigeria as a nation endures till then), the political terrain would be ripe for an Igbo President. Given the fact that the present ruling party is an admixture of strange political bedfellows, coupled with the disappointment, anger, ire and disdain felt in the core north against Obasanjo, there is speculation that the present Obasanjo-PDP equation is history; that it is time for another equation - that of an Igbo president with a northerner as his second in command. A combination of Rimi (as running mate) with, say Iwuanyanwu or Ojukwu or Orji Kalu or any Igbo of worth will be a thriller, a best seller and a winner any day in Nigeria if elections are free and fair. Let none expect Rimi to anger his base. He is nurturing his base for the vice-president position in 2003. If Rimi plays his cards very well and Ndiigbo theirs' he will be in a better position to run for Nigeria's presidency in 2008 using the platform of a predominant Igbo party on whose platform he ascended in the first place. He may be the one to right the wrongs done Ndiigbo in Nigeria. Every politics is local so said the sage. Whatever he is doing now or say therefore should be seen from that perspective. Rimi is not a fundamentalist. He is a pragmatist. He had gone to Dallas to wave the olive branch and to court the Igbo friendship. I think he is looking for a winning strategy/formula rather than spying for anybody. Dallas and the occasion of WIC activities may not have been the proper place. In this regard, I think he was ill advised. The WIC should not return his money. I think he means well. 
Godson Offoaro Postscript: Ndiigbo here we go again. Other parts of Nigeria and even the British believe we are not good politicians. Sometimes, we take a decision and follow it through without sitting down to weigh all the ramifications including benefits and consequences. Most of us want autonomy. What if autonomy does not come right away? Are we willing to continuously suffer the present degradation and marginilization in Nigeria? Can we start taking our own destiny in our own hands? What if the time for autonomy has not really arrived? What if in the meantime we support the creation of a dominant Igbo party and at the same time keeping our eyes closely to MASSOB and Ralph - our future president? What if…. |
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