Obasanjo’s Afrodemocracy

Yesterday, Kingsley Chinda — the minority leader of the lower chamber of Nigeria’s National Assembly and his colleagues, took their advocacy for a return to the Parliamentary system of government, a system that was practised in Nigeria’s first republic, characterized by violence, coup d’etat and civil war, to a former president of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.

In their opinion, these people think that the way out of the doldrums for Nigeria is a parliamentary system of government.

But Obasanjo disagreed with them. Instead, he advocated for what he called “Afrodemocracy”.

In his monograph titled: “The Lust for Power and its Tragic Implication for Nigeria,” Professor Abubakar Siddique Mohammed of the ABU Zaria exposed Obasanjo as a leader with long-nurtured ambition to entrench a sit-tight leadership in Africa. According to him, Obasanjo had even authored a book in which he advocated for a one-party state. Siddique’s book was published in 2006 when OBJ was trying to elongate his tenure.

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Therefore, I am not surprised by Obasanjo’s “Afrodemocracy”. What Obasanjo is advocating is either a monarchy or any authoritarian system. This Obasanjo, who is now condemning Western liberal democracy, became a president under the same system. He didn’t use his time as president to change the system to “Afrodemocracy”. It is now he realizes that the Western liberal democracy does not suit African countries.

Obasanjo knows that what he is advocating is not only unsuitable, outdated, and tyrannical but also dangerous. Obasanjo is just hoping that there should be a coup d’etat in Nigeria because only morons can use the guns to overthrow the government and change the system. These advocates don’t have even the power to take us back to the dark days of the parliamentary system, much less to change the whole system in favour of Obasanjo’s Afrodemocracy.

So, no saner person should ever support Obasanjo’s contraption called “Afrodemocracy”.

Comrade Bishir Dauda wrote from Sabuwar Unguwa Katsina