I'm backing Toy in and Oga Cornelious in saying that we should stick to not leaving the ball to kick the leg no matter what we think of the merits or demerits of opponents arguments. In Jubrins case I had wanted to say that before Moses timely intervention that he (Jubrin) had made an opposing argument elsewhere. I had wanted to say he might be airing an opposing but dominant view from a part of Nigeria to which he is more connected so that he might not be accused of just k ow towing to the dominant thread in the forums discussion without presenting dissenting views. It's enough to show merits and demerits of a particular argument without an attack on the person of the presenter or his group interests.
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.
-------- Original message --------
From: Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin.adepoju@gmail.com>
Date: 30/01/2018 07:19 (GMT+00:00)
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Why Dangiwa Umar Should betheStandard-bearer of the Third Force
Farooq has again chosen to entertain us with a culture of insults while no one insulted him.
How wise is it to divorce ethnicity from Nigerian politics, even in seeking leadership?
Is that genuine disinterested critique or unrealistic analysis?
Can we avoid the implications of the current ethnic configuration of Nigerian politics?
Note that Farooq is not presenting Umar bcs he is the best candidate Farooq knows. Farooq is presenting him as a candidate from the Muslim North bcs he sees the current national mood as favouring a Northern Muslim candidate, note that Northern in this context invariably means Northern Muslim on account of the Muslim dominance of that region, even though there are Northern Christians too. Farooq also references arrangements among Nigerian political parties.
First, its not true that the national mood favours a Northern Muslim candidate. The Buhari experience, following on much blind hope, has inspired much disillusionment with that demographic. Secondly, its this regional sharing arrangement that is the root of Boko Haram and the current terrorist crisis through either anger in believing onself to be cheated of the Presidency or the resolve to maximise its ethnic empowerment potential. While its good to be pragmatic, should we not also seek something that will take us out of this cycle?
It was the blind effort to ignore such considerations that gave us Buhari while anybody who studied him ought to know that he embodies a clannish mentality.
I am not pleased with what I see as the identification of leadership from the Muslim North with non-technocratic figures like Buhari, in spite of all his political appointments in a career in which he is knot known for any achievement or even any occupation outside such appointments, and even Col.Umar, whose quantification to lead Nigeria as presented by Farooq centre on the military man's integrity and do not include any track record beyond the military.
Integrity and the otyer values farooq ascribes to Umar are good but how far beyond baseline qualifications are they?
We need technocrats. We need to broaden our pool.
In such a large pool why is it such a person with minimal qualifications in managing an enterprise that is being invoked?
If he were Yoruba, Igbo or Ijaw would he have stood out?
Please lets not pretend that various Nigerian ethnicities are weighted differently in considering their leadership capacities, a situation that gave us such an educationally and professionally handicapped person as Buhari in the first place.
Please lets raise our bar and also keep in mind such issues as the Fulani herdsmen terrorist menace in which most Fulani are either silent or openly or tacitly supporting the terrorist agenda.
Has Col. Umar contributed anything on this crisis, for example?
toyin
On 30 January 2018 at 01:57, 'Klalli' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> wrote:
The key question is this. What has the man-Col Umar- done since his retirement from the army in 1993 at age 42-43 to show that he has the capacity for the job of President? And what did he do during his military career to show that he can be an effective president in modern day Nigeria.
-----Original Message-----
From: 'Adeshina Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com >
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com >
Sent: Mon, Jan 29, 2018 6:26 pm
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Why Dangiwa Umar Should be theStandard-bearer of the Third Force
--I think the responses to Kperogi's article have failed to properly understand where he is coming from with his recommendation. I am surprised that, again, we are reading ethnicity into the genuine search for a genuine leader with the capacity to lead Nigeria out of the wood. The real question is: where do we get a good leader? The real answer ought to be: Anywhere! It doesn't matter whether the one we are looking for is Hausa, Fulani, Igbo or Yoruba. We simply need a good leader who can transcend his or her ethnicity and attend to Nigeria. It actually also does not matter if the person is military or civilian. There is nothing in the democratic tenets that forbids anyone from putting him or herself up or from being put up for the office. Indeed, there is nothing in democratic practice that guarantee epistemic certainty about the choice of who we want in the office. Buhari represents a present example of the uncertainty embedded in democracy. But then, isn't that the wonderful thing about it all: Our capacity to deliberate critically on who want to elect, the person's capacity (and not ethnicity), the person's antecedents (and not profession), etc. If Col. Umar has what it takes, do please let's elect him into office. To hell with where he came from!Adeshina Afolayan, PhD
Department of Philosophy
University of Ibadan
+23480-3928-8429
On Monday, January 29, 2018 7:33 AM, Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin.adepoju@gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks, Segun.
I wonder why this fixation on a particular ethnicity, and people without any or little track record of technocratic leadership.
de tin tire me
toyin--
On 29 January 2018 at 03:11, segun ogungbemi <seguno2013@gmail.com> wrote:
This alternative choice you have proudly advertised is as deadly as Buhari in the circumstances in which Nigeria is under the yoke of the Fulani herdsmen.More importantly, his genealogical background makes him extremely dangerous considering the jihad of his great ancestor, Othman dan Fodio who attempted to Islamize the country that became Nigeria. His destruction of indigenous cultural values which his followers still teach in the country has caused the under development of Nigeria.Furthermore must we believe ex-sldiers are Nigerian political, economic and social Messiah? Don't we have millions of credible fellow Nigerians in and outside the country that can save the country from your perceived end of the time, if Buhari is reelected?Finally, let us stop recycling the same ethinic leaders and look for others with impressive track records. The electorate can be of help if we ask them to make the choice.Segun Ogungbemi--
On Jan 28, 2018 19:15, "Olayinka Agbetuyi" <yagbetuyi@hotmail.com> wrote:
Except that I want us to end a culture that sees military men as the best (over civilians) even in a civilian dispensation (I stood against the candidature of OBJ to succeed Abubakir for the same reason) Umars past recommends him as a potential successor to Buhari with the following caveat:
that he upholds the gentleman's agreement that like Mandela he will not rule for more than one term and that he finds a suitable civilian candidate from the next zone to rule be adopted as his running mate and groomed to ensure the continuity of the programmes that brought Buhari to power iin the first instance which going by Umars past credentials he (Umar) is expected to pursue with relentless vigour originally expected from PMB.
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.
-------- Original message --------From: "Farooq A. Kperogi" <farooqkperogi@gmail.com>Date: 27/01/2018 07:30 (GMT+00:00)Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Why Dangiwa Umar Should be theStandard-bearer of the Third Force
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--Twitter: @farooqkperogi
While there is a widening consensus that President Buhari, through his remarkable incompetence and bigotry, is inexorably leading Nigeria to infernal ruination, there isn't a sufficiently robust discussion on who should replace him. Most politically unaffiliated people who have accepted that the presidency is above Buhari's mental paygrade simply say the swashbucklers in PDP can't be his replacement.
It's time to move beyond that rhetoric. Who is a viable alternative to Buhari? Who has the capacity to steer us away from the path of perdition we're headed under Buhari? There is a curious reluctance to confront these questions forthrightly. This reluctance conduces to the flourishing of dishonest and exasperating bromides like "Well, we know Buhari is incompetent, but what is the alternative?" or "Although we agree that Buhari hasn't lived up to expectation, there is really no alternative to him at this time."
It's like being led to a pit of hell by a blind guide and saying, "Well, there is no alternative to this guide, so I have to come to terms with my earthly damnation." That's pointless, boneheaded self-immolation. Only people with a perverse taste for self-violence reason like that. There ARE several alternatives to Buhari.
In my December 16, 2017 column titled "There Must be an Alternative to Buhari and Atiku," from which former President Olusegun Obasanjo quoted in his recent press statement, I suggested that we give a thought to Retired Colonel Abubakar Dangiwa Umar.
"How about we try someone else? Off the top of my head, I can think of retired Colonel Dangiwa Umar widely acknowledged as just, fair, principled, hardworking, cosmopolitan, widely traveled, and well-educated," I Wrote. "I'm not suggesting that he is perfect. He is not. No one is. It is our imperfections that make us human, but we all know what sorts of imperfections ruin nations and its people. I don't think anyone can accuse him of those sorts of imperfections—sloth, lethargy, corruption, clannishness, incompetence, indecisiveness, etc. He may decline to throw his hat in the ring. But there are many like him."
I see that there is now a growing conversation around getting Col. Umar interested in a run for the office of president in 2019. But I am also aware that some people have raised concerns about the symbolic burden of his military background, particularly because of justified national anxieties about the domination of our politics by past military people. This is a legitimate concern.
Nevertheless, I believe Umar's military background is incidental to his qualification for this job. It is the strength of his character, his urbaneness, his record of inclusivity, his contagiously genuine passion for pan-Nigerianism, his stubborn commitment to higher principles, his vast knowledge of the ways of the world, his intellectual curiosity, his unflappability in the face of stress and strain, and his broadmindedness that stand him out and that would potentially make him such a comforting departure from the blight we're mired in now.
There are many others like him, but I am suggesting him for at least two reasons. One, the national mood appears to favor a northern presidential candidate, perhaps as a consequence of the internal power-sharing arrangements of most political parties. Second, the only northerner, in my estimation, who is "salable" outside his natal region based on his record is Umar.
His uncommonly principled stand against the cancellation of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, which caused him to voluntarily resign his commission from the Nigerian military, will resonate with many voters in the southwest. He fought General Sani Abacha with all his strength when it was extremely risky to do so—and at the cost of libelous smears and threats to his life.
His exemplary, even-handed management of the 1987 religious crisis in Kaduna is still a reference point. "If you win a religious war, you cannot win religious peace," he famously said. "Since the killing started how many Christians have been converted to Islam? How many Muslims have been converted to Christianity? It is an exercise in futility."
He is one of only a few northern Muslim leaders that northern Christians trust and have confidence in. Although he is a direct descendant of Usman Dan Fodio (his father was Wazirin Gwandu), he is on record as being severely critical of religious bigotry by Muslims, a reason he isn't popular in his immediate constituency.
He was also one of only a few northerners to recognize the legitimacy of IPOB's angst and to caution against government's strong-arm tactics against the group. "One of the swiftest ways of destroying a kingdom is to give preference to one particular tribe over another, or to show favour to one group of people rather than another, and to draw near those who should be kept away and keep away those that should be drawn near," he wrote in a press statement on August 30, 2017. "Like Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, many Igbos genuinely feel marginalized since they belong to the category of those who gave Mr President only 5% of their votes and appeared to have fallen out of his favour."
Whatever foibles Umar has, ethnic and religious bigotry aren't one of them. Given the unprecedented dissension and acrimony that Buhari's government has instigated in the nation, we need a clearheaded, mild-mannered, even-tempered nationalist to bring us together, to calm frayed nerves, and to inspire us to dream again. I see Umar fitting this role.
He will certainly lose in the northwest and in such northeastern states as Borno, Yobe, Bauchi, and Gombe. In these states, most—certainly not all—people would vote for Buhari even if he were to go on a murdering spree of people there. Those who survive the carnage would still vote for him. But remember that the votes of this bloc were never sufficient to make him president.
If he were to square off against Buhari in a free and fair election in 2019, Umar would handily win the deep south, the southeast, most of the southwest, and the northcentral, except, perhaps, Niger State. In essence, he would reduce Buhari to the ethno-regional champion he had always been, which was reversed because of the purchase his candidacy got in the southwest and the Christian north in 2015 as a consequence of Jonathan's intolerable misgovernance.
But if Jonathan was clueless, Buhari embodies cluelessness on steroids. Buhari's cliquishness, insouciance, and down-the-line incompetence are a clear and present danger to Nigeria's continued existence. Reelecting him in 2019 would be the kiss of death for the nation.
It's impossible for Nigeria to survive a 4-year extension of Buhari's misrule, which is characterized by rampant injustice, invidious selectivity, insecurity, unexampled nepotism, smartly dressed corruption, sloth, intellectual laziness, hardship, and directionlessness. You know a country is utterly leaderless when it has a president who proudly says "I am not in a hurry to do anything" while the country he supposedly governs burns.
Umar won't be perfect. He would falter. The intoxication of power may alter him. And maybe not. But the beauty of democracy is that it imbues us with the power to change ineffective leaders. It is the incremental rectification of past electoral mistakes that aggregates to qualitative change in democratic societies. No society makes progress by reelecting transparently incompetent leaders.
Related Article:
Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.Associate ProfessorJournalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & MediaSocial Science BuildingRoom 5092 MD 2207402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.comTwitter: @farooqkperogAuthor of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World
"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
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