At first, like every sane Nigerian, I took President Muhammadu Buhari’s response to his wife’s criticism of his government as a joke (taken to far). And even agreed with Malam Garba Shehu’s description of it as as such on Twitter, that “(President Buhari) was obviously throwing a banter.” But the President’s unnecessary restatement of that misogynistic caricaturing of his wife in a subsequent interview, clarifying that indeed “she belongs in my kitchen, my living room and the other”, was devastating. And this was done in front of Angela Merkel, a woman that manages a country more prosperous than his and ranks higher than him in the global political equation. Yet that wasn’t a clue to keep his patriarchy to himself.
The tragic thing is, what Mrs. Buhari said wasn’t even damaging. It was an explicit praise of the President, which was why I attempted to understand her interviews on BBC in Hausa and then English as a PR stunt developed to exonerate the husband. For that’s a convenient inference from her claim that the government has been hijacked by strangers and opportunists.
I even likened her gut to that of her fictional American counterpart, Mrs. Claire Underwood, reputed for audacious ambition and manipulation of events to secure her husband’s political capitals. House of Cards fans may get this analogy.
For a President serially accused of nepotism and parochialism, Aisha’s interviews, in that initial interpretations of them by me, seemed like a strategic PR for President Buhari. Her criticism only portrayed him as he once described himself, that he “belongs to everybody…” All the things she said, intended to be a criticism of her husband, only projected a favourable image of the man.
For a fact, Aisha wasn’t speaking for me, probably not for anyone outside her circle of partisan elite. She’s speaking for those who deserved or expected rewards for supporting Buhari. The hunger addressed in the BBC interview isn’t really that of the masses, but that of the same elite who aren’t eating as they anticipated. And so, following her logic, democracy is intended to be a grand house party for friends and family of the celebrant – the President.
Shouldn’t this have been explained by the President’s media managers as validation of the man’s famous declaration of belonging to nobody even though he belongs to all? Aisha Buhari’s argument could’ve been valid if she hadn’t based a point on Buhari inviting strangers and opportunists to his government. She painted a President of a naïve President whose government has been hijacked, and the man has already blown up his chance of stating she confused his magnanimity for naivety.
This tragic mismanagement of the delicate non-issue was the reason I didn’t’ even dissent with Garba Shehu, that Buhari’s remark on Aisha belonging to his kitchen and two other rooms was meant to be a joke. I only observed that it was a tasteless joke and at the wrong place and to an unforgiving audience. And that why the “joke” was even more unfortunate and dangerous is, it came from the head of an institutionally patriarchal nation, and it’s an unapologetic truth of what millions of our men think of women. From marriage to politics, our homes and offices, there is no aspect of our life that the men don’t exhibit a worrying superiority complex as the President’s
Perhaps the President was not disturbed by the media backlash that trailed his initial degrading response to his wife because patriarchy is a way of life in his country, and expressions as his aren’t interpreted so here. We shouldn’t be fooled, millions of us like this male-privileging social order even if we can’t make the delusion of grandeur public. Amongst ourselves, and deep within us, there’s a maddening patriarchal tendency seen in our reactions when we see car badly driven, a lady living alone, a lady over 30 unmarried, a lady heading a big public institution. Like all privileges, men see this patriarchy as birthright, something hard to unlearn. Like that racist who can’t imagine a world of all equal. And it will be foolish to praise the President for publicly shaming us all.
Buhari has goofed by degrading his wife in the eyes of the world, and he should apologise to her. But her outrage over his approach to governance was harmless. There’s nothing wrong with the President of Nigeria appointing citizens he didn’t know, or had never ever met, which seems to frighten his wife the most. That’s a partisan concern, not a national problem. If anything, we should commend the man for refusing to reward only those who supported him as expected by his wife and her ilk. It’s one thing to say Nigeria isn’t functioning as promised by the APC, it’s another to say it’s so as a result of existence of “strangers” and “opportunists” in the government.
As we await the next episode of the first family’s rumble, the President needs a retreat to reflect deeply on the legacy he intends to leave behind, and the impact of this politically incorrect example he advertised in his reaction to his wife. Buhari used to be a flawless model to some partisans, and their intellectual allies could have written the story of his struggles and named it “The Best President Nigeria Never had” if he had lost the 2015 Presidential Elections. Today, he’s falling down that popularity bar, and the speed with which this happens is the only motivation he needs to sit up. It’s likely he may not have a company in the “other room” soon, so what he really needs is a space to reflect, a Reflection Room. May God save us from us!
