December 30, 2008
At the height of his profligate tyranny which lasted from 1999 to May 29, 2007, the former dictator called Olusegun Obasanjo did bestride the Nigerian political firmament like a ghastly colossus who could neither brood dissension nor defeat in his unbridled ambition to lord it over a hapless Nigerian nation. In the desperation to carve the country in the image of his twisted fantasies, the individual bearing the apt sobriquet of African Caligula was to recruit and unleash on an unsuspecting populace an assortment of carpetbaggers and soi-disant technocrats who mimicked their master’s delusions in a manner that was at once sinister and mind-boggling, an attestation to the turpitudes of the former tyrant and his sidekicks. Three of these sidekicks need special mention here. They are Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, the former FCT minister, Nuhu Ribadu, ex-cop and erstwhile chairman of the EFCC and Femi Fani-Kayode, Aviation minister and bouncer extraordinaire in the pervious dispensation.
We are today living witnesses to the fact that the tin god who held sway at Aso Rock for eight wasted years has been reduced to a dismal figure – one condemned to a forlorn search for political relevance by engaging in peregrinations of dubious value in desolate patches of Central Africa. As for el-Rufai, Nuhu Ribadu and Fani-Kayode, their current demystification in our socio-political spaces should be seen as a befitting dénouement. Their respective attempts to launder their otherwise rotten image must be seen as a testimony to the charade that was the Obasanjo “theocracy”. An abiding lesson in all this is the aphorism that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Put differently, political power in all its ramifications must be seen as a temporal value that is best exercised responsibly. Those who fail to heed this injunction live to regret their transgressions.
It was the cosmopolitan Nnamdi Azikiwe who, in a terse retort to the antics of a rustic and insolent provincial politician during the dull but sleazy administration of Alhaji Shehu Shagari, did observe that no condition is permanent. What the wily Owelle was saying was that power is transient and those entrusted with it at any given time should use it for the betterment of their society. That Nigeria’s so-called leaders, irrespective of political orientation, have consistently refused to live up to this universal truth is indeed a sad commentary to our national political culture. And it bears mentioning that this repudiation of the universal law of power acquisition was most pronounced during the last Obasanjo regime. It is doubly worrying that those who were the main architects of the profound malaise that has taken hold of the land today are now desperately and without shame trying to articulate a completely false image of their reckless and largely irresponsible tenure through the use of Nigeria-related media including websites run by expatriate Nigerians. This commentary is partly a denunciation of the mendacious enterprise seeking to cast Obasanjo and his favorite acolytes in borrowed robes of patriotic engagement.
The image of Fani-Kayode in a Lagos jail on Christmas day; that of Nuhu Ribadu, the Obasanjo errand boy who also doubled as EFCC boss deservedly relieved of his commission as a cop and finally that of el-Rufai, the foul-mouthed former FCT minister apparently running from the law, these are outcomes that the former imperial ruler and his henchmen did not reckon with. Yet, Nigerians in their silent majority must be rejoicing, not because of the personal travails of the characters involved but because of the fact that singly and collectively, the loud-mouths who are now enjoying their just desserts, so to speak, were responsible for unprecedented assaults on the Nigerian democratic edifice and the welfare of the citizenry in general. It is a vicarious release to know that, like Samuel T. Coleridge’s ancient mariner and his wanderings, an antiquated potentate will aimlessly roam the rebel-infested jungles of the DRC while his former attack hounds continue to stew in the self-inflicted mess of their collaborative waywardness. Instead of showing contrition and remorse, the characters who actively participated in the systematic dehumanization of the Nigerian people have preferred to live a lie , no doubt a hangover from their delusions of power. They see their justified chastisement as an attack on “reformers”! In their abysmal insensitivity and lack of self-criticism, the likes of el-Rufai and Maurice Iwu, the contemptible INEC chief, would want the world to see them as belonging to a vanguard of an imaginary reform doctrine in Nigeria. They probably think Nigerians are that daft. As has been revealed by the recent National Assembly hearings, under the last kleptocratic Obasanjo tyranny, “reform” came to be synonymous with the reckless and primitive expropriation of the nation’s collective assets by a predatory few even as so-called technocrats endlessly ranted about a badly digested neo-liberal credo. And so, impunity and pork barrel politics became the defining features of a syrupy and deceptive reform rhetoric.
For much of the last quarter of 2008, the Nigeria-related press, both local and international, has been inundated with largely alarmist whining which has sought to portray the former EFCC chairman as a victim of supposedly malevolent forces that are out to destroy our dear country. That this kind of mindless and misleading propaganda has failed to have any resonance with the generality of the Nigerian public is quite instructive. And as if to remind us of the confederate nature of their enterprise, another Obasanjo hatchet man, el-Rufai, has reportedly instructed his lawyers to go on the offensive in a futile bid to paint a glowing picture of the former FCT minister in his stand-off with the EFCC.
In what seems like a childish ploy to seek impunity, el-Rufai is invoking the fact that he is a student in a foreign institution in order to avoid respecting EFCC summons. This should be condemned as irresponsible. The EFCC and other relevant bodies should redouble their efforts to see to it that those accused of wrong-doing while in government are made to answer for their alleged sins. Surely, in the case of el-Rufai, the point to start is his tenure as the former director-general of the BPE.
As a central component of the privatization scheme of the previous Obasanjo regime, the BPE was critical in the ex-despot’s much-vaunted fight against corruption. Its management did say a lot about the posture of the last government regarding the legitimate aspirations of the people.
In 2005, I penned a seminal document on the Pentascope scandal and its implications for the anti-corruption campaign of the Obasanjo dictatorship. It is my contention that the document is a useful reference point in understanding not just the man who ran the BPE but crucially, in assessing the deceptive “reform” cum anti-sleaze mantra of the Obasanjo misrule. The following is the link to the document in question: HYPERLINK "http://www.nigeriavillagesquare.com/articles/aonduna-tondu/el-rufai-and-the-pentascope-scandal-2.html" http://www.nigeriavillagesquare.com/articles/aonduna-tondu/el-rufai-and-the-pentascope-scandal-2.html
Today, much of the discourse around the more visible henchmen of the Obasanjo era would seem to underscore an interesting ideological divide. It is noteworthy that, for instance, adherents of the pro-Ribadu and, to a large extent, the pro-el-Rufai discourse have tended to be those who overtly or subtly supported the last Obasanjo regime and what the dictator had come to represent in the Nigerian polity. These days, it is a widely held belief that Ribadu and el-Rufai are reviled figures in much of the North, their immediate constituency. The story is not that different from elsewhere in the country. Objective minds do rightly castigate the excesses of either Ribadu or el-Rufai. These two young men have come to represent in our collective unconscious all that is wrong with those who would like to be seen as belonging to the new generation of national leadership. In the local thinking, Ribadu and el-Rufai are opportunistic apostates whose treachery and morbid obsession with power are a negation of the sterling qualities of humility, respect for constituted authority and for the people in general, its values and the common good. It is revealing that much of the local press in the North does not confer an aura of sainthood on the former allies of the ex-tyrant.
In lieu of pursuing their narcissistic and needless chest-beating about how they are “reformers” (even though the stark evidence points to the contrary) , characters in the el-Rufai, Nuhu Ribadu and Iwu mould should bow their heads in shame and ask for forgiveness. Nigerians, they say, are a godly people. Until a public and sincere apology is made by these individuals and their principal, the Nigerian people must continue to ask for retribution to be visited on those who sought to defile and squander the trust reposed in them as public officers.
By Aonduna Tondu
New York
We are today living witnesses to the fact that the tin god who held sway at Aso Rock for eight wasted years has been reduced to a dismal figure – one condemned to a forlorn search for political relevance by engaging in peregrinations of dubious value in desolate patches of Central Africa. As for el-Rufai, Nuhu Ribadu and Fani-Kayode, their current demystification in our socio-political spaces should be seen as a befitting dénouement. Their respective attempts to launder their otherwise rotten image must be seen as a testimony to the charade that was the Obasanjo “theocracy”. An abiding lesson in all this is the aphorism that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Put differently, political power in all its ramifications must be seen as a temporal value that is best exercised responsibly. Those who fail to heed this injunction live to regret their transgressions.
It was the cosmopolitan Nnamdi Azikiwe who, in a terse retort to the antics of a rustic and insolent provincial politician during the dull but sleazy administration of Alhaji Shehu Shagari, did observe that no condition is permanent. What the wily Owelle was saying was that power is transient and those entrusted with it at any given time should use it for the betterment of their society. That Nigeria’s so-called leaders, irrespective of political orientation, have consistently refused to live up to this universal truth is indeed a sad commentary to our national political culture. And it bears mentioning that this repudiation of the universal law of power acquisition was most pronounced during the last Obasanjo regime. It is doubly worrying that those who were the main architects of the profound malaise that has taken hold of the land today are now desperately and without shame trying to articulate a completely false image of their reckless and largely irresponsible tenure through the use of Nigeria-related media including websites run by expatriate Nigerians. This commentary is partly a denunciation of the mendacious enterprise seeking to cast Obasanjo and his favorite acolytes in borrowed robes of patriotic engagement.
The image of Fani-Kayode in a Lagos jail on Christmas day; that of Nuhu Ribadu, the Obasanjo errand boy who also doubled as EFCC boss deservedly relieved of his commission as a cop and finally that of el-Rufai, the foul-mouthed former FCT minister apparently running from the law, these are outcomes that the former imperial ruler and his henchmen did not reckon with. Yet, Nigerians in their silent majority must be rejoicing, not because of the personal travails of the characters involved but because of the fact that singly and collectively, the loud-mouths who are now enjoying their just desserts, so to speak, were responsible for unprecedented assaults on the Nigerian democratic edifice and the welfare of the citizenry in general. It is a vicarious release to know that, like Samuel T. Coleridge’s ancient mariner and his wanderings, an antiquated potentate will aimlessly roam the rebel-infested jungles of the DRC while his former attack hounds continue to stew in the self-inflicted mess of their collaborative waywardness. Instead of showing contrition and remorse, the characters who actively participated in the systematic dehumanization of the Nigerian people have preferred to live a lie , no doubt a hangover from their delusions of power. They see their justified chastisement as an attack on “reformers”! In their abysmal insensitivity and lack of self-criticism, the likes of el-Rufai and Maurice Iwu, the contemptible INEC chief, would want the world to see them as belonging to a vanguard of an imaginary reform doctrine in Nigeria. They probably think Nigerians are that daft. As has been revealed by the recent National Assembly hearings, under the last kleptocratic Obasanjo tyranny, “reform” came to be synonymous with the reckless and primitive expropriation of the nation’s collective assets by a predatory few even as so-called technocrats endlessly ranted about a badly digested neo-liberal credo. And so, impunity and pork barrel politics became the defining features of a syrupy and deceptive reform rhetoric.
For much of the last quarter of 2008, the Nigeria-related press, both local and international, has been inundated with largely alarmist whining which has sought to portray the former EFCC chairman as a victim of supposedly malevolent forces that are out to destroy our dear country. That this kind of mindless and misleading propaganda has failed to have any resonance with the generality of the Nigerian public is quite instructive. And as if to remind us of the confederate nature of their enterprise, another Obasanjo hatchet man, el-Rufai, has reportedly instructed his lawyers to go on the offensive in a futile bid to paint a glowing picture of the former FCT minister in his stand-off with the EFCC.
In what seems like a childish ploy to seek impunity, el-Rufai is invoking the fact that he is a student in a foreign institution in order to avoid respecting EFCC summons. This should be condemned as irresponsible. The EFCC and other relevant bodies should redouble their efforts to see to it that those accused of wrong-doing while in government are made to answer for their alleged sins. Surely, in the case of el-Rufai, the point to start is his tenure as the former director-general of the BPE.
As a central component of the privatization scheme of the previous Obasanjo regime, the BPE was critical in the ex-despot’s much-vaunted fight against corruption. Its management did say a lot about the posture of the last government regarding the legitimate aspirations of the people.
In 2005, I penned a seminal document on the Pentascope scandal and its implications for the anti-corruption campaign of the Obasanjo dictatorship. It is my contention that the document is a useful reference point in understanding not just the man who ran the BPE but crucially, in assessing the deceptive “reform” cum anti-sleaze mantra of the Obasanjo misrule. The following is the link to the document in question: HYPERLINK "http://www.nigeriavillagesquare.com/articles/aonduna-tondu/el-rufai-and-the-pentascope-scandal-2.html" http://www.nigeriavillagesquare.com/articles/aonduna-tondu/el-rufai-and-the-pentascope-scandal-2.html
Today, much of the discourse around the more visible henchmen of the Obasanjo era would seem to underscore an interesting ideological divide. It is noteworthy that, for instance, adherents of the pro-Ribadu and, to a large extent, the pro-el-Rufai discourse have tended to be those who overtly or subtly supported the last Obasanjo regime and what the dictator had come to represent in the Nigerian polity. These days, it is a widely held belief that Ribadu and el-Rufai are reviled figures in much of the North, their immediate constituency. The story is not that different from elsewhere in the country. Objective minds do rightly castigate the excesses of either Ribadu or el-Rufai. These two young men have come to represent in our collective unconscious all that is wrong with those who would like to be seen as belonging to the new generation of national leadership. In the local thinking, Ribadu and el-Rufai are opportunistic apostates whose treachery and morbid obsession with power are a negation of the sterling qualities of humility, respect for constituted authority and for the people in general, its values and the common good. It is revealing that much of the local press in the North does not confer an aura of sainthood on the former allies of the ex-tyrant.
In lieu of pursuing their narcissistic and needless chest-beating about how they are “reformers” (even though the stark evidence points to the contrary) , characters in the el-Rufai, Nuhu Ribadu and Iwu mould should bow their heads in shame and ask for forgiveness. Nigerians, they say, are a godly people. Until a public and sincere apology is made by these individuals and their principal, the Nigerian people must continue to ask for retribution to be visited on those who sought to defile and squander the trust reposed in them as public officers.
By Aonduna Tondu
New York
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