Eleven feelings on PMB’s return

Back in 2010 when President Umaru Yar’adua was ill and out of the country, I received a phone call from a foreign radio station. The radio reporter asked me what the feeling was in Nigeria regarding Yar’adua’s absence. Well, I replied, there was not one Nigerian feeling; it all depended on who was doing the feeling. I did not receive a call from any foreign radio station last Saturday asking me about Nigerians’ feeling about President Muhammadu Buhari’s return after 103 days abroad. In case someone is about to call, I am preempting him here. The answer is, there is no one Nigerian feeling regarding PMB’s return. There are at least eleven identifiable feelings on the matter.

The most conspicuous feeling in Nigeria on Saturday was that displayed by ordinary citizens in Abuja who gave PMB a rousing welcome from the airport all the way to State House. There was a lot of jubilation in the streets of Abuja and of other [Northern] cities. Buhari’s popularity with the grassroots is essentially because of the anti-corruption campaign, which has exposed monumental corruption among the country’s former rulers and brought many of them before the courts. Some say it is a sadistic streak in the common man to want to see former rulers humiliated but I think it is more than that. Almost all Nigeria’s public institutions are not working properly essentially due to corruption. The only snag to last Saturday’s jubilation was that Lagos and Southern Nigerian cities were quiet, another reminder to PMB to recalibrate his politics and prevent his heroic standing becoming regionally slanted.

There is the feeling of PMB himself. In the best of times President Buhari’s face is inscrutable, but it exhibited genuine delight last Saturday at being home again and for receiving such a warm welcome. His real thoughts will become clearer later today, when he does a broadcast to the nation. Many people expect him to come out swinging in order to make up for lost time, especially with respect to the fight against corruption, Boko Haram insurgency, economic recession, changes at the top, and the stalled social security programs. However, sickness has a way of reorienting a man’s thoughts away from hard tackles.

There is the feeling among what many newspapers now call “the Cabal.” This cabal is ill-defined but it is supposed to comprise the men who are closest to Buhari, personally and officially. Now, anyone who is close to a man cannot but be elated at his improved health and his return home from hospital. But of course PMB is not just a jolly good friend and relation but the most powerful Nigerian, the very access to whom is a key to great political and governmental power. The allegation is that cabal members were displaced from power during the Acting President’s reign and they would capitalise on PMB’s return to regain full power and influence. To what end, we shall soon see.

There is the feeling of Prof Yemi Osinbajo. As at this morning he is still legally the Acting President and will only cease to be when PMB transmits a letter to the National Assembly announcing his return. It is difficult to say to what extent Osinbajo enjoyed his acting role at the top. The Constitution meant for the acting president to exercise full presidential powers but in reality, it was worse than walking on a tight rope. Osinbajo was constantly looking over his shoulder lest PMB gets [or is sold] the impression that his mandate was being usurped, with the danger that he could roll back anything Osinbajo did. The best evidence of this soft treading was the long delay in swearing in two ministers and assigning portfolios to them, telling APC to hold off its national convention, and refusing to unroll any major new policy initiative.

There is the feeling among APC chieftains, beginning with its chairman and national officers. They have been trying since last year to hold a convention or at least a NEC meeting but were advised not to do so in PMB’s absence. They became more anxious when the Makarfi faction won its case at the Supreme Court and PDP seems to be reorganising. PMB’s personal attitude to politics was mostly responsible for APC’s disorganisation and with elections now looming, party leaders must be hoping for a changed attitude in order to save the party from fragmentation ahead of 2019.

Hot on the heels of APC chieftains’ feelings, there is also the feeling among disgruntled APC members. APC members all over the country have waited two years for appointments into boards of public corporations. A committee headed by the suspended SGF Babachir David Lawal that was charged with the task of compiling party loyalists for the appointments never finished the task. Another committee headed by Prof Yemi Osinbajo that took over the task earlier this year did not go far either. The administration has already exhausted half of its current mandate but under the firm political principle that half a bread is better than none, APC members are still hoping to get these appointments, or else.

There is the feeling among National Assembly leaders and members, who are more united than they have ever been. The secret to the National Assembly’s unity is not just the deft handling by Saraki and Dogara, but also because of the onslaught launched against them by the Presidency, which fuelled public anger at MPs as corrupt budget padders, selfish over-sighters and allowance guzzlers. In the past year the National Assembly launched a counter-attack against the Presidency. Its leaders will now be looking to see if PMB sustains his earlier posture of reconciling with them, or if his body language encourages Presidency hawks to launch a renewed onslaught against them.

There is the feeling among likely presidential aspirants. There is a growing number of people who want to become president in 2019. Some of them want PMB to anoint them. Others want to become vice president as a stepping stone to the presidency. Some others want to contest in 2019 if PMB is not running, while still others are determined to contest whether or not PMB is in the race. Each and every one of them must now be recalculating if PMB’s return has enhanced or impeded his chances.

Even though the opposition PDP issued a statement on Saturday welcoming PMB back to the country, there is no doubt that his return further complicates the party leaders’ boast at their convention last week to regain power in 2019. Just like its own fragmentation in 2015 assisted APC’s rise to power, PDP’s best hope for 2019 is for APC’s fragmentation due to a battle to succeed PMB. There is also the feeling of those who are at the receiving end of the anti-corruption war. Many top officials of the former PDP administration are standing trial for money laundering, corrupt enrichment or receiving armsgate money. Some, such as former NSA Sambo Dasuki, are languishing in jail while others such as former Petroleum Minister Diezani Allison Madueke are in self- exile. None of them can be happy that PMB is back in Nigeria, with the danger that the fight against corruption may gather steam.

Finally, there is the feeling among restructuring campaigners, who capitalised on PMB’s absence and dominated national discourse. Prof Femi Odekunle recently said on television that the restructuring campaign has good elements but in the hands of its current campaigners, it is but a gambit to change national discourse from the anti-corruption campaign. I think a cursory look at the top campaigners bears out Odekunle’s assertion. PMB’s best answer to the restructuring debate is therefore to intensify the anti-corruption campaign, hopefully with a systemreform component. [Note: Mahmud Jega will be on four weeks’ leave from today.]