FEATURE ARTICLE

[email protected] Political Scientist USA

HOW DO YOU SPELL ''IMPEACHMENT''?

he word "impeachment" is a long and fancy one. It sounds important and anyone saying it would give the impression that he or she is learned and wallowing in intellectual waters. That may very well be the case. But when it comes to our beloved legislators, one must ask the question, can they spell that word? I found it hard to believe that they came up with the word all by themselves, it is now clear that they were helped by some alleged $.5 million to learn the word and apply it to a sitting president. This word is perhaps, the most misinterpreted word in the democratic history of Nigeria. It is misused to achieve a specific political objective. It is the medium of political communication, the word every politician, depending on which side of it he stands, understands. It would be a political suicide if a politician pretends not to understand the import of the word once spoken.

It was no surprise that this very word was wrongly spelled not by one but two "honorable" and "distinguished" members of the Nigerian "House of Impeachment". A member of the House when asked by reporters in Abuja to spell what he was saying as no one seemed to understand his accent, spelled the word as "impitchment". Another in that same interview attempted to correct his colleague and spelled it as "inpittment." I'm sure many more of our "honorables" are misspelling it as of this moment. This obvious ignorance on the part of this elite group of citizens makes one wonder how they ever got elected. By what means and how? How can two "honorables" who are supposed to be lawmakers for a nation of 120 million not be able to spell a word which has made them rich and famous, a word which has brought food on their otherwise dry tables. A word which has enabled some of them to send their girlfriends to Rome, Paris, London, and what have you, on vacation? How can they be so ungrateful to this word which has buttered their bread in so many ways?

Our dear "honorables", when they finally figure out how to spell this "bread buttering" word will find it tough to implement it. In all reality, they would find it difficult to impeach the president as he has not committed any clear and outright impeachable offenses if the constitution of the land is anything to go by. I personally disagree with this point I'm making, but unfortunately for Nigerians, any impeachment must abide by the provisions of the 1999 military constitution which stipulates in no uncertain terms the grounds on which a president can be impeached. It will take a masterful finagling of affairs to achieve this under the current circumstances. If ineffectiveness were stipulated in the constitution as a reason for impeachment, no doubt, the House would have much to offer to the nation as grounds for impeachment. But regrettably, the president has not committed any clear impeachable offenses and the accusations being leveled against him by the House are very much subject to interpretation--accusations such as dereliction of duty, excessive trips overseas, disregard for the legislature, non-release of funds to the other arms of government, etc.

Even by a very conservative interpretation of the constitution pertaining to the impeachment of the president, the House would fall short, except it is able to effectively tie in the president's role in the murders of innocent citizens in Odi and Tivland and find evidence to convict him on those grounds. But given our polity, the reasoning would be put forward that the president was acting on available security reports and that he acted in defense of the nation. This case will be one for the lawyers who will give it assorted interpretations just as they did when an entire nation of more than 100 million [at that time] did not know what two-thirds of nineteen was in the 1979 presidential elections. Politicians and even Mathematicians argued this point back and forth. Even Alhajis who did not see the walls of elementary school became experts in complex mathematical equations, all in an attempt to solve this mathematical mystery. At the end, Shagari was swept into office leaving behind the politicians and academicians to deal with the equation.

There are many reasons why Obasanjo cannot be impeached. This is bad news in a democracy as it instantly becomes a dictatorship without the impeachment option. With the absence of this option, the power of the populace is taken away from them often leaving the president with no measure of accountability. Probity takes a sudden flight. On the other hand, if he is impeached, too many worms would be let out of the can and this will mean that the country will be dragged into dark periods of uncertainty and recklessness. We have been through this before. If the House is serious with this threat and continues to prosecute it, its members would soon be reminded by some faceless individuals that they too have their own dirty laundries that could be washed in public if they continue to wash the president's own dirty laundry in public. At this point, the whole dirty laundry washing in public exercise will be taken indoors and that will be the end of it.

We should know by now that Nigeria is not a straightforward society. For one, most, if not all, of our legislators themselves are impeachable. Most of them have committed impeachable offenses in the last forty months to get them out of office in a hurry. They are not the ones to impeach the president. Did they not try this before? What happened? As it stands now, no elected Nigerian official has the moral podium to impeach the president. They are all guilty of corruption themselves, violation of the constitution and dereliction of duty, the same offenses they have accused Obasanjo of. Let us look to our Senate for an example. How many presidents has that body had in forty months and why were they impeached or removed one after the other within months? One thing is for sure, that they were not removed from their high stools for their noble acts of honesty.

The second senate president, Dr. Chuba Okadigbo, became the epitome of corruption in his own right with his thirty-two official cars and jeeps and his dubious spending of the senate funds ranging in the billions of naira. In all of these forty months, various members of the upper house have fished in the muddied waters of corruption often walking away with big catches. Wasn't it these same senators who recently had a reconciliation party to forgive themselves of their corrupt indulgences and let by gone be by gone? Wasn't it Senator Gbenga Aluko, the young man from Ekiti who proposed this "let's dump the Kuta panel recommendation and forgive one another" motion to his colleagues? And of course, they all embraced it. These our "honorables".

The House has not fared any better than their senior partners in crime as their own speaker, Salisu Buhari of kano, was removed in disgrace after it was discovered that he was only 29 years of age and not 36, as he had claimed. If I recall correctly, this was the same gentleman who secretly graduated from the University of Toronto. The graduation was so secret that the university had no record of his attendance. It is only in Nigeria would one find individuals who lie about their age in both directions, down-wards which is usually the trend and upwards, a new trend started by a duly elected member of the Nigerian House of Representatives. The House members are greedy, corrupt to the core, and often have no knowledge of what it means to be a democrat and a representative. In forty months, no one can point to any meaningful bill they have passed to enhance the lives of Nigerians. Most of them have not visited their constituencies in months and some in over a year.

They use funds meant for their official travels for their personal gains. They misuse government resources, their office workers and cars. They lie about their expenses, they collect estacode for trips they never made and if they make those trips, they go about their personal businesses instead of the peoples'. These were the same ones who hurriedly set themselves up with a N5 million furniture allowance in the first few days in office even before the dignitaries and guests at the elaborate inauguration ceremony at Eagles Square in Abuja left town. These are now the ones wearing their holy jackets and casting stones at an equally corrupt and inept president.

The impeachment train should begin with our corrupt legislators and dock in Aso Rock after picking up passengers from the various state government houses and legislatures. I tell you, this will be one train that will be overflowing with passengers. With the palpable corruption of our legislators, our National Assembly would have to be made up of a mixture of heavenly beings such as Angel Gabriel, Angel Michael, the Arch Angel [whoever he is] and "saintly" earthly creatures such as the Pope, etc, for the moral grounds to be there for the impeachment of the president. For this purpose, we might beg God to bring back Mother Theresa to join in the impeachment proceedings against the president, if only temporarily. Her honesty and objectivity will be badly needed.

The reality in Nigeria is that Obasanjo can never be impeached because the Yorubas will never understand no matter how well you articulate it to them? Never mind that they did not support him in 1999. Never mind that the PDP did not win much votes in any of the six principal Yoruba states of Oyo, Ogun [his own state], Ondo, Osun, the "almighty" Lagos and Ekiti, not including Kwara and Kogi which also has Yoruba population. Never mind that they "disowned" him during the elections and called him a "military stooge". In a Nigeria where ethnic politics is pervasive, any attempt to impeach him, however credible, would be viewed as an anti-Yoruba move.

The Yorubas would come to a sudden realization that Obasanjo is one of them and must be protected from the political vultures and opportunists lurking around Aso Rock. We are knee deep in this ethnic divide that we are oblivious to reasoning and decorum. This viewpoint is aided by the circumstances by which Obasanjo made it to Aso Rock. Given the fact that Abiola was denied the presidency by the Hausa/Fulani duo, the Yorubas became heir to the throne by default. They said it was only fair to do it that way. Everyone else threw their hands in the air and accorded them this opportunity to heal the wounds inflicted by the events of June 12, 1993. Thus, Obasanjo became president not by popular votes, but by popular sympathy.

No one can dislodge him from Aso Rock by way of impeachment in light of this ethnic argument. It will be an expensive venture, too costly in the human and material sense. Any plans to this effect would be blanketed as sinister given the ethnicity of the man who stands to gain the presidency, Alhaji Abubakar Atiku of Adamawa. It would be seen as the work of the Arewa Consultation Forum and given the fact that the speaker of the House has not been a political bedfellow of the president, the conspiracy theory would gain credibility with each passing day. It will be seen as another ploy to sneak power to the north as Atiku would assume the presidency for the reminder of Obasanjo's term and will win a fresh four years with the aid of the apparatus of state. With that, no Yoruba man, no Igbo man, not Ijaw man, no Kalabari man, no Okrika man, no Edo man, no Udoma man, no Ogoni man, no Efik man, no Ibibio man would have an address with Aso Rock on it for decades to come.