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From: Folake Olowookere <olowookerefolake@yahoo.com>
Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2013 08:34:10 -0800 (PST)
To: ayo_olukotun@yahoo.com<ayo_olukotun@yahoo.com>
ReplyTo: Folake Olowookere <olowookerefolake@yahoo.com>
Subject: CONTROVERSY OVER JONATHAN'S ONE-TERM 'BOND'
CONTROVERSY OVER JONATHAN'S ONE-TERM 'BOND'
BY
AYO OLUKOTUN
Politics is very much in the air. Our politicians being who they are, may swear by the Holy Books that they are too busy governing us to care about the next major election, but no one believes them for their actions speak louder than their words. This of course is not peculiar to Nigeria; in the older democracies intellectuals have noted the onset of permanent campaigns fuelled by media pervasiveness whereby politicians from the very day they are elected, begin to prepare for the next election. Needless to add however, that the frenzy of round the clock electioneering varies from one country to another.
It should not be difficult to understand, therefore, the controversy that dominated the headlines regarding the statement credited to Dr. Babangida Aliyu, governor of Niger State that President Goodluck Jonathan committed himself on paper to a bond to serve as president for just one term. So far, no one has come up with a copy of the bond, although some governors of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) including Aliyu maintain that they are in possession of a certified true copy.
In the ensuing, debate that has trailed Aliyu's bombshell, which appears to constitute a devastating set back to the Jonathan for Second Term Campaign, arguments have been advanced touching on the legality, morality and propriety of any such undertaking. Obviously in a more assured political tradition, an understanding or a gentleman's agreement would have sufficed for the parties. Afterall, British democracy to cite a well known example has survived for centuries with a constitution that is largely unwritten and where the forces of convention, precedent and political etiquette remain strong. But in our circumstances laws and constitutional stipulations set down in black and white are flouted flagrantly leaving the cheated to seek legal recourse or rock the boat in order to get a hearing.
Hence, it is imaginable why the PDP bigwigs would have sought and probably contained, assuming one exists, a written undertaking from President Jonathan. Ours is a system, if we call it that which operates on very low trust, whether we are talking about relationships among political actors, between state and society or within society itself. To be sure, nowhere on earth is politics driven by a religious revivalist's moral handbook. Lying, deception, concealment, half truths, evasions, spinning, even forgeries are the stuff of politics around the globe. Recall that Peter Oborne's book: 'The Politics of Lying' which grippingly documents the disappearance of truth from British political life as well as Professor John Meorshermer's 2011 book entitled "Why Leaders Lie", were written about the established democracies. The difference, as this columnist sees it between those other democracies and Nigeria lies in the extent and pervasiveness of political dishonesty and outright fraud.
In contexts where the state is, to employ Professor Larry Diamond's characterization 'little more than a criminal racket' perpetual tricksterism becomes an unwritten rule of the game and of course a frightening indicator of political cardiac arrest.
Under the military, 'transitions without end' to adopt the title of a well known book, becomes the favourite strategy for prolonging dictatorial rule. Gowon's announcement that '1976 was unrealistic; Babangida's annulment of June 12, 1993 elections as well as Abacha's self succession campaign exhausted the limits of ruse and deception as political weapons of elongated tenure. General Obasanjo's abortive third term project under our militarized democracy was a logical sequel to the unhappy narrative of the years of predatory and largely visionless one man rule. It is true as Jonathan's sympathizes have argued that he has the constitutional right to run for another term but it is also the case that just as his emergence as Acting President in diffident and difficult circumstances were subject to political calculation and expediency; his 'right' to a second term cannot be viewed outside of a whole range of factors such as national inclusiveness and prior agreements (even if unwritten) among the dominant political class.
In an email response to one of my recent interventions on this page, Gabriel Ogunmola, distinguished Professor of Chemistry and Chancellor of Lead City University, Ibadan argued that those celebrating Nigeria's amalgamation tend to overlook the fact that an amalgam is a chemical term which suggests that there 'are ingredients that prevents the composition of any amalgam from forming definite entity with defined properties'. In other words, after a century of amalgamation a hauntingly exact word, Nigeria is yet to move from amalgamation to union; from colonial cloning to a modern federal state.
To connect that point with the controversy over Jonathan's second term bid is to understand that a nation waiting to be built is one in which leaders should take account of the myriad forces and factors that make for coherence and solidity or for incoherence and dissipation. If it required negotiation and consensus building to get Jonathan into power through the so called doctrine of necessity and closed door pre-election negotiation in 2011 who says that a mere assertion of his renewed interest in the top job and strident emphasis on his constitutional rights are all it takes now? This is all the more so considering the linkage drawn by many analysts between the resurgence of Islamic radicalism and its offspring of Boko Haram and the bitter dispute that trailed the PDP presidential primaries of 2011.
On a broader canvas, the ongoing debate about the prospects of a second term for Jonathan cannot be divorced from popular perceptions of his performance and the fulfillment of his election promises. Those who feel that he has performed poorly are likely to line up behind any attempt to tilt the scales in his favour; while those who believe that he has done very well or those who are profiting immensely under his presidency by hook or by crook are more likely to be found in the ranks of the 'no vacancy in Aso Rock' campaign. In the absence of scientific studies to measure performance, one can only depend on impressionistic assessments as gleaned from the popular media and pavement radio as the French like to call it. In this respect and outside isolated achievements such as the holding of credible but far from flawed elections under his watch there are very few success stories to narrate. What this means for party politics is that if the choice of the flag bearer for PDP in the run-up to the 2015 elections will be based on popular appeal and chances of impressive showing at the polls then Jonathan is unlikely to get the ticket. However, this is a theoretical suggestion considering the current rumblings within that party and the use of strong arm tactics to suppress or flush out those who disagree with the helmsman.
A final point to consider is whether the President against the tide of opportunistic advocates of his candidature has the courage and the nobility to set a precedent which rejects personal advantage but privileges ethics, prior understanding and concensus building. By not running he may disappoint those urging him on for all kinds of reasons but he will be reaching a new benchmark in statesmanship.
Olukotun is a Professor of Political Science and Dean Faculty of Social Sciences at Lead City University, Ibadan
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