One beauty of Western liberal democracy, Nigeria claims to be practicing, is its term limit. Without a term limit, democracy in this part of the world will be a charade if it’s not already. Since the taking over of the affairs of Nigeria as the ruling party, the party and its leaders have been taking Nigerians for granted. The party, obviously, like all other parties in Nigeria, has derailed from its core mandate of serving the masses.
At various fora, the national leader of the APC, President Muhammadu Buhari, has promised that the 2023 general elections will be free and fair, and we all believe him strongly. PMB made this promise both to domestic and international audiences, thus, throwing wailers into the dumpster.
Three events happened within a week which raised concerns to the extent of questioning PMB’s moral and ethical principles for refusing to act against any of the principal actors, as neither of them is bigger than the party’s big stick, which PMB is holding as the national leader of the party (though he is a symbolic leader, as Bola Ahmed Tinubu – BAT is the recognised national leader of the APC). One wonders where PMB is when these three conspirators of truncating our 2023 general elections are preparing their action, while the national custodian is nowhere to be found.
It all started with Abdullahi Abbas, Kano state chairman of the APC when he declared that no matter what, their party, the APC.(which is also the national ruling party, thus, the party of PMB, who have been promising us free and fair elections come 2023 since last year!) will win all seats in Kano state by any means. Still neither PMB nor Governor Abdullahi Ganduje has called Abbas to order. It is all quiet, like nothing happened. In the said video, Abbas claimed they have all necessary “logistics” for winning elections,. What are these “logistics”? In Nigerian political parlance, we all know what it means by “logistics” when it comes to elections.
The Abbas fire was flaming when that of Ado Doguwa, the House of Representatives Majority Leader, came out of the blues. Doguwa’s threat was more direct and apparent in nature. The Honourable was heard saying “Ranar zabi, Wallahi, mutum, ko ya zabi APC ne, ko ya ci ubansa”, meaning “on election day, you either vote for APC, or we will decisively deal with you.” The confirmation that Doguwa was serious was his repetition of the threat in the video. Till today, neither Doguwa nor any of his foot soldiers came out to deny the video.
Still, neither the APC nor PMB did anything to these people for reasons best known to them. As they say, silence is not golden at this time. Both the APC and PMB must come out publicly to either align with these people or with Nigerians. One way they will align with Nigerians is to mete appropriate punishment and other relevant sanctions to these people so as to serve as deterrence to their likes in the coming days.
The silence of PMB and APC opened another Pandora’s box of threats from fellow APC big wigs. If PMB claims that Doguwa is an elected representative, protected by legislative immunity, what of his serving Aviation Minister, Hadi Sirika? Hadi Sirika at an event organised at the Hilton Hotel Abuja, sent a thunderous threat to Katsina state electorate to vote Dikko Radda. Sirika claimed they (APC) have money, logistics, and people. He said he got employments for people, and issued threat to an unnamed individual, which everyone knows he is referring to Mustapha Inuwa (the immediate past SSG of Katsina state), that he (Sirika), Dikko Radda, and Aminu Bello Masari cannot lose elections in their local governments, and he (Inuwa) cannot visit any of the above mentioned local governments.
The APC of today seemingly lives in the shadow of violence more than the PDP Nigerian electorate truncated eight solid years ago. It is unfortunate that PMB kept promising us that he is going to superintendent a free and fair election in 2023, but these utterances are coming from his lieutenants or die hard supporters. We all know PMB’s relationship with Hadi Sirika, as well as Kano APC in general, and PMB kept mute about these utterances, neither cautioning these people by action or by words, just typical PMB!
On Saturday, December 10, 21st Chronicle online news quoted PMB saying “We can’t win elections without unit”. PMB seems to forget that there must be purpose before people can become united, which is today missing not only in APC but all other political parties in Nigeria.
Like him or not, this is one feature that distinguishes Obj from PMB. If OBJ were the one that believed in a free and fair election come 2023 in Nigeria, he will never let these children of his disrupt the election for him and the country no matter what. He will use both his personal big stick and the party’s stick to call them to order. But here we are with PMB, just folded his arms and watching his boys about to sink the ship, him as the captain idly watching them doing nothing to salvage the situation (remember his 1984 famous speech?).
One thing I am optimistic about these people is meeting them on election day. Nigeria and Nigerian electorate will prevail that day, and we will meet at the polling booths! Then you will understand that Nigerians are smarter than what you think.
This was exactly the thinking of PDP at its dieing moment. They believed they were doing us a favour for lording it over us! Today, Hadi Sirika, Doguwa, and Abbas believed it was a favour for Katinawa, Kanawa, and Nigerians in general to have them in leadership positions. In todays’ Nigeria under APC’s guidance, even the president’s security is under question, his health care is entrusted to foreign health institutions as well as foreign professionals, etc.
Nigeria is bigger than these people all together, and Nigeria will prosper no matter what. By 2023, they will come to realise that they are the real losers not Nigeria and Nigerians. Then they might come out of their slumber and begin to respect ordinary citizens of this great country. May Allah Almighty save us, Ameen.
Abdullahi from Dallas, Texas, United States via, [email protected]
