To find another Abba Kyari

With the relaxed restrictions in Nigeria, Covid 19  still sits in the front burner, problems compounding by the rising incidences of the virus against the public taste and abuse of new found freedom.

The pandemic remains a preoccupying challenge before President Muhammadu Buhari as more attention would now be demanded  by the urgent need to deal with the debilitating effects.

Globally, the test of leadership is the national response to the pandemic – saving lives, giving palliatives to the hungry and restoring jobs to the jobless, all in effort towards salvaging crashed economies.

My mind settles on President Muhammadu Buhari as he attempts to manage these affairs of government, in the face of a crisis situation without Abba Kyari, his Man Friday, his Chief of staff.

I imagine this to be a most trying time when the pain of losing a dear pillar of dependence, registers most.

Abba Kyari was where the buck stopped if you believed the buck stopped at Buhari’s table.

Like a goal tender, was Abba Kyari to the Buhari team and game.

The pain of his loss is surely more pronounced in the new normal, and if President Buhari is to address the mandate challenges now complicated by Covid 19, a Chief of Staff is crucial and the tragic absence of indefatigable Malam Abba Kyari is more felt now.

I feel for the President and all who worked with this persona whose true amiable nature was revealed only in death.

I did not have a personal knowledge of Abba Kyari even though we belonged to the pen profession.

He did call me a few times to comment on this opinion column either to caution, correct a perspective, or to commend me.

But it was not my privilege to have met him personally and this saddens me.

Now in reflecting on who can replace him, I can not help but take an overview of the Buhari management template from his emergence in the limelight as Military Head of State in 1983 to date.

It seems to  have remained constant, an administration, driven by close confidants, pivoted on a central clearing house with an unusually powerful close confidant and associate as personal aide.

In 1975 when General Murtala Mohammed became head of State, Buhari served as Governor of the North East of Nigeria, but had barely settled down when on 3rd February 1976, the North Eastern State was dissolved into three states Bauchi, Borno, and Gongola, and Buhari then became the first Governor of Borno State.

Not long after that, Murtala was assassinated and Buhari returned to the main stream till 1984 when upon the ouster of the civilian regime of President Shagari General Buhari became Head of State.

Even then, the governance template I alluded to as being an administration, driven by close confidants, pivoted on a central clearing house with an unusually powerful close confidant and associate as personal aide was operational.

The then Chief of Staff General Tunde Idiagbon was seen as more than de facto Vice President, he was the powerhouse.

I served in Buhari’s Petroleum Trust Fund as Zonal Media Consultant in charge of the North East Zone.

Assisting General Buhari then, to manage the PTF was young Ahmad Salihijo, the most diligent forthright, committed, and patriotic young professional I have known.

He headed a team of like minds in a firm, AfriProjects Consortium.

Though President Buhari was Executive Chairman of the PTF, so much did he trust Ahmad Salihijo that you could put your thumb down, same as Abba Kyari now, the buck in the PTF stopped at Salihijo’s desk.

So similar was Buhari’s leaning in this Government on Abba Kyari that all I thought of was the tragic death of Ahmad Salihijo when I was told that the Chief of Staff, Abba Kyari had tragically succumbed to the home call of God. But then so similar are the characters of both Ahmad and Abba, and looking further back, I can say, ditto Idiagbon.

It begins with Buhari himself, unquestionable patriotism, personal integrity, and spartan life, a more than ideological dedication to impeccable leadership.

This attracts to Buhari, men like Abba  and Salihijo, brilliant and knowledgeable, of boundless loyalty, energy, and long suffering in service, abhorrent of sleaze, corruption, and completely devoid of primordial tendencies.

Alhaji Mamman Daura’s testimony of Abba states “Malam Abba Kyari was a man blessed with mountainous gifts and uncommon attributes of intelligence, diligence, hard work, loyalty to friends and worthy causes.” This testimony fitted equally, the late Salihijo.

Thus in reflecting on who might be appointed as replacement for the late indefatigable Abba Kyari, one fact is certain.

President Muhammadu Buhari it is clear, grooms his dependable men.

No one can claim to make him recommendations except of course his known close associates in the collective. Even at that, President Buhari himself asserts that he has a mind of his own on such matters.

Arrogating to myself the wherewithal however, I look across faces of a lot of key players in the administration now and seek one who in the Buhari collective has those inherent attributes of Tunde Idiagbon, Ahmad Salihijo, and Abba Kyari. And there are.

The latitude is wide to encompass several young associates, men and women, that President Muhammadu Buhari has brought to prominence and to positions of responsibility, now doing well to help him succeed over the years, through many public offices.

It also depends on his frame of mind.

A mind desirous of continuing from where Abba Kyari left off on infrastructure, and as well weighing in the need to confront the security challenges of armed banditry, kidnapping and which include the bogged down Boko Haram counterterrorism may seek a Chief of Staff not only with the qualities of Ahmad Salihijo, and Abba Kyari, but adding military and governance experience.

Surely the matter of national security is by far President Buhari’s most pressing challenge as the tenure’s end in 2023 becomes imminent.

This consideration may affect and determine the choice of a replacement for the late Abba Kyari sending Buhari to his military constituency to find another Abba Kyari.

Need I say I do not know who will be, but I know who will not be?

I plagiarize a thought.