The Turaki, the Nigerian political landscape, the professionals in politics and national productivity

By Gozie Irogboli….

The Nigerian political landscape has many bizarre features and ugly peculiarities. In more civilized climes politics and leadership are about group and national interest. Politics in the Western World is driven by ideology and the desire to advance the state interest and common good but in Nigeria it is a different thing altogether. A peep into the events in Nigeria political setting indicates many unsavory developments occasioned by the overweening tendencies of those in power.

In broad terms, the Nigerian politicians can be categorized into three—the military politicians, the career politicians and the professionals in politics. The military politicians are known for their impunity, primitive arrogance, cavalier attitude and supercilious tendencies. The military politicians because of their regimented orientation believe only in command and control. They are inflexible in their approach to issues as they appear to see civil politics as an extension of their military career. They want absolute loyalty—loyalty to self, not to the system or the nation. They do everything including intimidation, blackmail, suppression and harassment to grab and sustain their hold to power.

Almost all the time they create ethical crisis in their decisions and actions due to their unwillingness to accept democratic tenets and inability to distinguish between personal interest and national interest. They brook no criticism, tolerate no opposition, loathe dissenting views and suppress free speech with brutality. OBJ created EFCC and ICPC ostensibly to fight corruption but used them as tools to tyrannize those who opposed him. PMB followed suit albeit in a more ruthless manner. The military politicians because of their brutality and official high-handedness are always afraid to step down from office for fear of reprisal action. OBJ tried desperately to foist a Third-term agenda on Nigerians. PMB, despite his aweless performance, his age and deplorable health status, wants to continue at all costs.

The military politicians are very poor conflict managers. They believe in bulldozer tactics and arm-twisting. They have unreasonable belief in suppression, and the use of force as the only means of conflict resolution. OBJ’s answer to the Resource Control agitation in the Niger Delta was the use of force which resulted in the destruction of Odi and blood bath at Choba, Port-Harcourt and Zakibiam in Benue State. It took the wisdom of Yar’adua, a bloody civilian to stem the tide of violence in the Niger Delta. The military politicians pretend to be disciplinarians but their idea of discipline is issuing orders and inflicting punishment on others rather playing according to the rules, being principled, and showing exemplary conduct, being tolerant and exercising self-control.

By and large, the military politicians because of their arrogance or ignorance have poor sense of civic duty and responsibility and hence their predilection to abuse office. They seem to believe only in nuisance value and so they are never ever proactive in their attitude to issues. They promote mediocrity, cronyism, escalation of conflicts and crisis since they seem not to believe in civil advocacy, stakeholder engagement, interest articulation and aggregation. Buhari has stubbornly refused the strident call for the restructuring of the country and has arrogantly consigned the report of the National Conference into the dust bin.

The career politicians who do not have jobs other politics are primarily driven by the desire to be at the corridor of power by any means necessary. And because most of them are jobless they do everything to grab power and remain in power even if it means pauperizing their people in order to be able to manipulate them. To these group politics is not a calling to serve; it is a do-or-die affair. And because they don’t have other means of livelihood, they are usually corrupt—a reason they would always want to install a puppet to clear the mess they always leave behind while in office. The career politicians are only interested in beguiling the masses and having their way. And they are always able to get away with it because the Nigeria masses are a poor, ignorant, helpless and disoriented lot who are gullible and malleable and therefore do not hold the politicians accountable for their actions.

The career politicians in Nigeria behave as if they are not answerable to the electorates but to their greedy and unscrupulous godfathers. When they are not having their way, they play the ethnic or the tribal cards. The jobless politicians are like leeches and drones who survive at the expense of the nation. They play politics without principles or ideology. The only known ideology appears to be self-aggrandizement or tribalism.

Generally, they get to the office through unorthodox means and use violence and force to ensconce themselves in office. Like their military counterpart, they don’t quit when they should and even when it is inevitable they must, they would want to always cling on to power either by self-succession or by proxy by installing members of their families or cronies and then sit in the background as godfathers to manipulate the system. They believe in propaganda and divide and rule tactics. They have no sense of achievement. That is why some of them claim achievement where there is obviously none. Most times, what they call achievement is self-indulgence, appropriation and primitive accumulation of our common wealth. When they open their mouth, they gabble about patriotism and national interest just to bamboozle the ignorant masses. But to them, their parochial interest is considered supreme over general interest.

Distinct from the military and career politicians are the professionals in politics. This refers to those who have got remarkable accomplishments in their chosen careers and businesses before venturing into the murky waters that is the Nigerian politics. The primary interest of people in this category is to make a mark; to leave a legacy. They are usually people-oriented and performance-driven unlike the military and the career politicians who are driven by egoism and hence their ruthlessness and incredible bulimic tendencies. The professionals or technocrats are interested in their image and accomplishments—exhibiting a courteous, conscientious and generally business-like manner in the course of their duty—as the Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary put it.

However, this does not preclude the fact that there are professionals who have been bitten by the bug of mediocrity and selfishness prevalent in the country. It is not out place that there may be some professionals whose performances are constrained by the influence of their godfathers who brought them to office. Yes, the professionals are not infallible but they are more or less driven by a sense of self and corporate accomplishment since in their various trades, they are used to challenges, targets and deadlines. Professionals are leaders, they take responsibility for their actions; they don’t pass the bulk. Professionals are conscious of their actions and decisions and as much as possible they try to follow global best practice.

A real professional is conscious of his image, his professional affiliations and his future. They believe in stakeholder engagement unlike the arrogant jackboot soldiers who see their fellow countrymen as their subjects rather than compatriots. Rather than serve, the military and the career politicians want to be served and worshipped; a little wonder they refer to their compatriots derogatively as ordinary citizens. They believe in cronyism and godfatherism while the professionals believe in merit, due process and peaceful transition. Professionals are conflict managers; they believe in alternative conflict resolution mechanism rather than coercion.

Without doubt, the contributions of the professionals in the politics of our country are invaluable. Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Prof. Dora Akunyili, Oby Ezekwesili, Akinwumi Adesina, Ndi-Okereke Onyuke, Frank Nweke Jr and the very few that acquitted themselves creditably in office in our recent democratic experiment were all professionals. Before Ben Murray-Bruce assumed office as the DG of NTA, NTA never did 24 hours broadcasting but under him, it began. He also made sure that NTA stations were built in all the states of the Federation to ensure effective grassroots broadcasting.

In the past, we had people like Dr. Alex Ekwueme who was an accomplished professional architect and businessman. Despite the attempt by the Buhari-led military junta of 1983-85 to indict him, the special military tribunal acquitted him and declared that he left office poorer than he was before he entered office.

We also had the Umar Musa Yara’dua who accomplished so much within a short period. He reversed some questionable decisions made by OBJ. Among other things, he reduced fuel price, increased workers’ salary and NYSC allowances, nullified the privatization of NNPC, restored Ibeto cement, started the dredging of the Niger, created Niger Delta Ministry and ended Niger Delta militancy by granting Amnesty to the agitating youths—something OBJ could not do in spite of military braggadocio. During the period of electoral tribunal trial challenging his election to power, he had openly declared that if the tribunal overturned his election, he would not challenge it. Under him and his successor, Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, Democracy thrived unfettered in Nigeria. The NASS operated unhindered, human rights respected. There was freedom of speech and there was press freedom and unrestrained civil advocacy. The minorities, the weak and the vulnerable group were protected. The judiciary was free. Court orders were obeyed unconditionally; a reason why the rigging in the South West under OBJ was overturned by the courts. Dr. Peter Obi of Anambra State who unarguably demonstrated that he is one of the most effective governors this country has ever produced was an accomplished business man before he assumed office.

Thus, it would be in the interest of the electorates to consider electing people with track records of performance into office for obvious reasons. Electing those without a sense of accomplishment is a blunder and it is the scourge that is ravaging the nation at present. It is a risk the nation must not take again if we must move forward and take our rightful place in the comity of nations. The current sorry state of affairs in the country is obviously the after-effect of military hangover even though some people shamelessly blame it on past administration and the existence of imaginary cabal.

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In the current dispensation, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar (GCON), the Turaki of Adamawa fits perfectly into the mould of professionals in politics being an accomplished business man with a large business empire and one of the highest employers of labour in the private sector Nigeria. Clearly, it takes a lot of effort, discipline, commitment and skills to build a thriving business. A genuine business man is a people and a resource manager and that is also what it entails to manage a nation. By building a profitable business empire, he has proved clearly that he is a prudent resource manager; somebody we also need now that our economy is tottering in the doldrums.

Moreover, by working and creating an indomitable political structure across the nation, he has proved to be a good relationship manager; a skill every great leader must have. In civilized climes, leaders are effective relationship and resource managers. Nigeria is in dire need of a bridge builder who would work assiduously to re-unite the country factionalized by the divisive tendencies of the current regime.

The Turaki is not known for playing the ethnic or the religious card. Sometimes, the ignorant public thinks the professionals are naïve because they tend to play according to the rules—the reason they thought Jonathan was clueless and Yara’dua slow. Only the Turaki and the few like him have played principle-based politics, devoid of bitterness and ethnic rancor. He had been at the forefront of the campaign to restructure the polity despite the stiff opposition from the North, his own constituency.

And in the past, he had made sacrifices for Democracy in Nigeria. He had willingly stepped down for MKO in the prelude to the June 12, 1993 election in the interest of the nation. He was a foundation member of PDP and had made invaluable contribution that led to the restoration of Democracy in 1999. He was one of those who made principled opposition to OBJ’s ill-contrived third-term agenda in 2007.

Gozie Irogboli is an economist, a consultant and a public policy analyst.

 

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