The front pages of Nigeria newspapers last week were dominated by big-wig political defections. In Nigeria, it is now a measure of major national elections when politicians loudly traffic themselves from one big party to another.
It could have been no bigger than last week, marked by the defections of at least one governor and tens of Senators and Representatives of the All Progressives Congress (APC) primarily to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). The latter, by the way, is reported to be changing its name in a rebranding effort to blot away its 15 years of political evil.
In an accompanying development the following day, Senate President Bukola Saraki-who is widely-expected to depart the APC-and Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu, found their homes barricaded by hordes of security agents trying to arrest them. Saraki, ever so slippery in such circumstances, disappeared into thin air and re-emerged at the National Assembly, where he immediately engineered a two-month recess.
It turned out that the police had sent an invitation to Saraki at 8p.m. the previous evening asking him to report in exactly 12 hours for questioning over the Offa bank robbery, to which he had been previously linked.
And then President Buhari met with some of the defectors, some reports said, in a meeting at which some of them allegedly ‘begged’ to be allowed to return to APC. But according to other accounts, the president had nothing against the defections, saying he had been assured that their action would not affect the balance of power in the National Assembly in favour of his party.
It was easy to get drowned in those and many other bizarre stories and miss the startling report of the International Crisis Group (ICG) which says that in the first six months of 2018, the herdsmen-farmers conflicts became six times deadlier than the Boko Haram-related attacks. It accounted for up to 1,300 deaths.
In addition, says ICG, “It has displaced hundreds of thousands and sharpened ethnic, regional and religious polarization. It threatens to become even deadlier and could affect forthcoming elections and undermine national stability.”
The report makes clear that at the heart of the problem are drought and desertification which have “degraded pastures, dried up many natural water sources across Nigeria’s far-northern Sahelian belt and forced large numbers of herders to migrate south in search of grassland and water for their herds.”
ICG also affirms that insecurity in many northern states arising from the Boko Haram insurgency in the north east, along with rural banditry and cattle rustling in the north-west and north-central zones, has prompted increasing numbers of herdsmen to migrate south.
It further says, “The growth of human settlements, expansion of public infrastructure and acquisition of land by large-scale farmers and other private commercial interests, have deprived herders of grazing reserves designated by the post-independence government of the former Northern region (now split into nineteen states).”
It is easy to see how this careful analysis can cause problems within, and therefore for, the current Nigeria government. Remember, President Buhari has blamed the problem on late Libyan leader Muammar Ghaddafi and a fictitious chain-reaction for which he holds responsibility.
The implication is that while the ICG report credits his government with responding to the problem by sending the security agencies, the nature of that response is to quell violence that has either ended or is underway.
The first concern here is that the agencies are distracted from focusing on the militants in the northeast, which may have been the reason for their successful invasion, in mid-June, of a military base in Yobe State, with hundreds of soldiers then reported to be missing. It was the second such attack in two days, the first carried out on a military convoy in Borno State, where the government had declared the militia completely defeated six months earlier.
The second concern, therefore, is that the government’s response does not target the source of the problem because the Buhari leadership prefers a different interpretation of what it is.
In any conflict, sending armed troops into an area after violence has taken place neither protects those who have suffered the violence nor provides justice, nor does it provide assurance for those who may be affected next.
This is why Buhari’s reluctance to actively arrest, disarm and prosecute the so-called “Ghaddafi” militia is not helping the true cattle herders, not helping the farmers, not helping those dislocated by Boko Haram into the paths of the marauding herdsmen, and not helping Nigeria.
In the report, the ICG observes: “The conflict is fundamentally a land-use contest between farmers and herders across the country’s Middle Belt. It has taken on dangerous religious and ethnic dimensions.”
Buhari’s refusal to accept this analysis does not change what it is; it just handicaps his ability to act as a respected leader. Worse still, his failure to follow up his internationally-derided “Ghaddafi” excuse with appropriate deterrence and prosecution is an indictment of his leadership and his re-election claims.
This was my deep worry about the defections and manipulations in the political landscape last week. An army of politicians trading political party affiliation for money or the privilege of being allowed to contest unopposed, is a shame.
Most of these politicians, we know, are charlatans. They have no commitment to the constitution or to service, let alone a party. They rarely visit their constituencies, and what is really being contested is the path to Abuja’s access and excess. They do not care about the issues, or whether you are killed by Boko Haram, policemen or AK-47 “Ghaddafi-men.”
It is no surprise that members of APC want to return to PDP, or vice-versa. As I have continued to say, they are one and the same party, with the same philosophy or lack of one. The ongoing horse-trading, with apologies to the horse, proves this.
In the end, the reason Buhari should not be re-elected, and why he will be an even worse failure should he be, is that he has become part of the problem he used to lampoon. He is either incapable of understanding any of the challenges facing Nigeria, or-where he has a faint clue-is unwilling to do what it takes.
The challenge before the Nigerian voter, therefore -if he cares about his future-is simple: DON’T vote for ANYONE who campaigns under the flag of the PDP or APC. Now they are pointing fingers at each other, as if they are in any way different.
But you, dear voter, you are different and sensible. You have seen them for 18 years: now campaign and vote against them by name and by type.
No, Nigerian, you are not hopeless. You don’t have to know whom to vote for, but you certainly know whom to vote against. It is the easiest vote in two decades.
Correction
In “Mixed Metaphors: How to spell commitment,” (15 July), I inadvertently referred to “the” as “the indefinite article.”
I meant to express the exact opposite, as “the” is a definite article. I thank my vigilant reader, Komolafe Oluwaseun, for pointing out this error.
• @SonalaOlumhense
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