RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Is Buhari declaring amnesty for corrupt politicians?

....... but this is not a normal situation. BH is still running amok in the northeast; the oil price is down;
and an unusual amount of power outages are taking place. The President's hands are full. The corrupt politicians
could link up with BH and other sympathizers and destabilize the country completely.Note also that one of the most
lethal ex-soldiers of all time is not in his camp - and could link up with some of the gladiators.
The President has to look very carefully before he leaps into WAI version 2 or WAI Remix.
I would think that at best he has to wait until his regime is stable.

It is true that with time, some of the corrupt may become too big to jail. This reminds me of
2009 in th US. Faced with corrupt bankers and banks the Obama regime had a few choices:
Bail out the banks, let the banks fail or/and jail the bankers. Had he attempted to let the banks fail
and prosecute the corrupt, the Dow would have dived. The stock market would have collapsed completely
and the Republicans would begin to point fingers and claim victory amidst the chaos. Anyway maybe this is not
a perfect analogy but it shows the dilemma leaders such as Buhari face on taking office.

Mandela took the easy way out, some will say: Truth and Reconciliation - and the Brits, the IMF and
Bush- Cheney would leave you alone for a while. No doubt some of the former apartheid gladiators are now
emboldened and are making strategic alliances. The Nigerian chessboard is not racially
tarnished but let's say that there are quite a few elephants in the room.

Anyway, Ken knows that I don't write more than this.

GE

Professor Gloria Emeagwali
History Department
CCSU. New Britain. CT 06050
africahistory.net
vimeo.com/user5946750/videos
Gloria Emeagwali's Documentaries on
Africa and the African Diaspora

________________________________
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Bode [ominira@gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, May 30, 2015 11:22 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Is Buhari declaring amnesty for corrupt politicians?

Because I consider probes to be the rites of passage that Nigeria needs for social maturation, the most unsettling part of Buhari's speech is the ambiguity in his suggestion that he would not settle old scores. There are two individuals, at least, with whom we know Buhari has personal scores to settle: Ibrahim Babangida who overthrew him in a coup in 1985, and Olusegun Obasanjo who twice rigged elections against him. If the reassurance were for these two alone, there would have been no need to address it to the Nigerian public in an inaugural speech. This makes me think he is talking about a larger group of leaders who fear Buhari might come after them for reasons one could only imagine has to do with official corruption. If the latter were the case, then, Buhari has just declared general amnesty for corrupt leaders. This is very troubling indeed, and it may well be the statement that would be most predictive of his future as President. Going after corrupt leaders is not settling scores, there is nothing personal about it, and it is not only morally and politically imperative, it is the constitutional duty of the President, the very oath of his office.

Contrary to those who view probes of past governments as the third rail of Nigerian politics; who argue that Chief Awolowo's failure to become President in 1979 is directly connected to his statement that he would probe Obasanjo, I would argue that it is a political imperative for Buhari to probe these leaders for the country to become a country of laws. In other words, whether Nigeria makes the transition from a Society of Status to a Society of Laws depends absolutely on whether past leaders are made to account for what in the public eyes are their many misdeeds. It will be naïve for Buhari to think that these gladiators will fade away into the night once he declares amnesty. No, it will embolden them. They will always continue to seek relevance and peddle the influence they have amassed through corruption. They will ultimately undermine Buhari's programs and when they do, Buhari would have lost the support and goodwill of the people to fight back. It is then that the fight against corruption will take on a personal score. Now is the right and only time; when the window of opportunity closes, it will take another rare cosmic alignment to bring Nigeria back from ruins. It is not a waste of energy or a distraction as some in their wisdom are counseling, it is a political and economy necessity. Probes are the rites of passage that Nigeria needs for social transformation and maturation.

Bode Ibironke



On 5/30/15, 3:50 PM, "Nnaemeka, Obioma G" <nnaemeka@iupui.edu<mailto:nnaemeka@iupui.edu>> wrote:


President Buhari gave an excellent speech. However, "prologue" is the wrong word in the context it is used: "A few people have privately voiced fears that on coming back to office I shall go after them. These fears are groundless. There will be no paying off old scores. The past is prologue." We can parse the word which way we want, it does not make it correct.

Obioma Nnaemeka, PhD
Chancellor's Distinguished Professor
President, Association of African Women Scholars (AAWS)
Dept. of World Languages & Cultures Phone: 317-278-2038; 317-274-0062 (messages)
Cavanaugh Hall 543A Fax: 317-278-7375
Indiana University E-mail: nnaemeka@iupui.edu<mailto:nnaemeka@iupui.edu>
425 University Boulevard
Indianapolis, IN 46202 USA
________________________________
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com<mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> [usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com<mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>] on behalf of Bode [ominira@gmail.com<mailto:ominira@gmail.com>]
Sent: Saturday, May 30, 2015 1:47 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com<mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re-"The Past Is Prologue"

There are many phrases in that speech that makes me suspect I know who may have contributed to the speech from this list! In any case, CAO, neither the prologue nor the epilogue are part of Act, one introduces the audience to the first Act and the other provides additional information not known to the audience even after the final Act. How can the past come after the final Act of Buhari's Presidency, that is just about to begin? By saying the past is prologue, could he be saying the past is not the main Act or focus of his presidency? I agree as an idiom, it could mean a lot more…

Bode

On 5/30/15, 1:01 PM, "Chidi Anthony Opara" <chidi.opara@gmail.com<mailto:chidi.opara@gmail.com>> wrote:


President Buhari while trying to debunk opinions in some quarters that he would be vindictive in power said in his inaugural speech that "the past is prologue".

One have been at lost at what the president meant by that quote, within the context of the message he was trying to pass across.

The president surely, could not have meant that he would preface (start) this present with the past, which is what his quote potrayed in my opinion.

What about "the past is epilogue"?

CAO.

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