2023
Jibrin Ibrahim
2023 Campaign: It’s Still a Four Horse Race
Jibrin Ibrahim, Deepening Democracy Column, Daily Trust, 3rd February 2023
As the general election campaigns intensify, the first problem today is how will the elections hold without money both in politicians’ pockets as well as in people’s pocket. As a parting gift to most Nigerians, President Buhari in his wisdom has decided that the current generation of Nigerians must also suffer the trauma of emergency currency change which our generation suffered in 1984. His idea then, as it is today, is that it is a method to catch looters of the national treasury who will be forced to reveal their stolen monies. The problem then, as it is today, is that whatever the merits of the approach are, there is massive collateral damage among the masses.
Yesterday, I listened to the Jigawa State Commissioner of Finance, Ibrahim Babangida Ganza complain bitterly on BBC Hausa Service about the suffering of the people. He explained that salaries were paid on 25th January. Six days later, 70% of government workers have not been able to access their salaries despite spending all day and all night on ATM queues. He explained he has visited and met with officials in eight banks in Dutse the State capital. They explain that they receive only two million Naira a day from the Central Bank and since salaries have been paid, it simply is not enough to meet customer’s needs. He requested that they issue small bills – N20, N50 and N100 which are not under any restriction but the banks say they are not getting that either from the Central Bank.
The scenario for a perfect social storm has been created. Workers with money in their banks have hungry families at home because they cannot access their own money to buy food. Traders and their families in Jigawa are hungry because they are not in the world of electronic transfers and customers have no cash to buy their produce. Meanwhile the wider ramification is that the Naira, suffering from runaway inflation has ceased being a store of value. Now, it is no longer playing its role as a means of exchange. The Central Bank of Nigeria has now become a Special Purpose Vehicle working very hard to dismantle Nigeria’s financial, commercial and economic system under Presidents Buhari’s Watch. Already, markets near borders are trading with CFA Francs from neighbouring countries because they cannot access Naira. At the same time, the cost of living crisis is being exacerbated by acute fuel shortage. Hungry people are angry people so something must change if Nigeria will run peaceful elections in three week’s time.
On the political front, there is a lot happening regarding the leading presidential campaigns. The presumption among pundits is that the two leading candidates are Bola Tinubu and Atiku Abubakar. The evidence for this assumption is not clear. Bola Tinubu has been weeping and gnashing his teeth that his path to the presidency is being sabotaged by enemies in his own party working against him deep in Aso Rock. Of course, he has not done himself any favours by his inability to articulate even one sentence without a gaffe, his repeated failure to recite the verse that proclaims the genuineness of the Muslim-Muslim label he created for his campaign and his manifest health challenges that is crying out to Nigerians that this candidate might be too medically challenged to rule.
In this context, the inheritor of the voters Tinubu is losing might well be Atiku Abubakar of the PDP. Atiku has been beaming not just because of the rapid decline of Tinubu’s chances, especially in the North West but also because Governor Wike and his Gang of Five have failed to agree on and unveil their preferred presidential candidate. The fact of the matter is that the G5 of Nyesom Wike of Rivers State, Samuel Ortom (Benue), Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu), Okezie Ikpaeazu (Abia) and Seyi Makinde (Oyo) have almost no voters to offer Atiku Abubakar. The votes they thought they could have offered Atiku in four of the States have been taken by Peter Obi and they themselves are in delicate political situations.
The G5 have however become the stars of the campaign by holding frequent meetings in Nigeria and abroad, dressing up in fancy clothes and displaying their beauty on catwalks. I am particularly impressed by their carved walking sticks and hats as significant fashion statements. I must however confess that as a political scientist, I have not yet been able to decipher the political value of their fashion shows. Nonetheless, they add colour and style to an otherwise nasty campaign.
The dramatic decline in Tinubu’s chances may not necessarily be a gain for Atiku Abubakar. Indications are that Rabiu Kwankwaso has excellent vote catching skills which he is deploying in the Northwest zone. He is running a good campaign, is not too old, is in full control of his faculties and has bragging rights given his good governance records from his two terms as Kano State Governor. Kwankwaso remains a contender in the race.
The other contender is Peter Obi of the Labour Party who has shown himself to also have a creditable path to Aso Rock. He has galvanised youth enthusiasm and support and appears to have already secured the votes in the South-east and South-south. He is also making significant gains in non-Muslim parts of Northern Nigeria as well as having a strong base in Lagos.
As the elections approach, the four leading candidates remain on course to realise their ambitions. The APC candidate, Bola Tinubu counted his eggs – 21 APC governors offering to deliver their states too early. The days of governors “delivering” their states are over. Under the BVAS electoral regime, voters, citizens deliver votes to who they want. Thanks INEC for your great work. The PDP candidate, Atiku Abubakar nonplussed at losing five of the fourteen governors in his camp now has his eyes on inheriting the famous 15 million voters Muhammadu Buhari used to have in his pocket. Not so fast says Rabiu Kwankwaso, I am the popular one in the zone and I will get the votes for my NNPP. Meanwhile, Pete Obi is running an excellent campaign telling young voters in particular that for too long, politicians have promised and failed to deliver positive change and he is the real purveyor of change. May the best candidate win.
Oluwatoyin Adepoju
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Toyin Falola
Jibrin:
Why is anger missing from this piece?
Are you not entitled to some anger or you have become a born-again, converted to the Pa Adeboye’s Ministry of Hope?
TF
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Jibrin Ibrahim
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Cornelius Hamelberg
Dear Professor Ibrahim,
Many thanks. For the demystifying. And of course, you are not a pacifist or a pacifier, you are a fighter, even as, in defiance of the commandment that says ”Thou shalt not taunt thy neighbour” Ojogbon is on the warpath again, taunting you and trying to tease you out with his suspicion that - God forbid - you may “have become a born-again, converted to the Pa Adeboye’s Ministry of Hope”, it’s good to know that you remain cool, calm, committed and collected , as usual , far removed from any vestiges of anger - from a Christian point of view, said to be one of the seven deadly sins, or any pious masquerading under the banner of some kind of “righteous indignation” or “holy wrath” for it is written “Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, says the Lord.” - the most extreme form of the hubris that you have avoided as when we hear someone say, “ And when I’m angry, that means that the Almighty is angry” - the one holy exception to this is to be found in the Quran, Surah al maidah 33-34 - a warning to those miscreants who want to make war against Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala & His Messenger.
It’s gratifying to know that with regard to the eighteen wannabes who are competing for the glory ( Presidency of Nigeria) for which it would seem some of them are prepared to sacrifice their blood/ sell their grandmothers, you are not thinking in trinitarian categories about the hopefuls, that it is no longer a three-horse race and you have now added the 4th horseman of the apocalypse in the person of Rabiu Kwankwaso in my book, a good guy, who hopefully like a swarm of locusts will snap up a great deal of the votes that wannabe Alhaji Atiku Abubakar wants to harvest from the North-West zone. But what about the Northeast - near Cameroon where Atiku is stronger? After all, for the good of the nation, the more votes Rabiu Kwankwaso can steal from Atiku - anywhere and everywhere, the better, and obviously not that kind of stealing that The Almighty had in mind when He legislated “Don’t steal ” - I believe that what the Almighty also has so clearly in mind in the Divine anti-corruption legislation is don’t steal from the national treasury - the people’s patrimony
Sill on the subject of money matters - re - “President Buhari in his wisdom has decided that the current generation of Nigerians must also suffer the trauma of emergency currency change which our generation suffered in 1984.” - it’s incomprehensible that inadvertently there would be some method in the madness, that Brother Buhari’s APC government would choose to deliberately shoot itself in the leg by precipitating such a foreseeable outcome, social crisis, more suffering imposed on the long-suffering masses, leading to disenchantment with his government, revolt, because of the ensuing scarcity of money in circulation and the consequent hardship being wittingly or unwittingly imposed on the masses just weeks before the winner takes all elections - what you describe as “ massive collateral damage among the masses.” Hopefully, the situation will ease by the last two weeks before election day on the 25th of this month. Otherwise, should - God forbid - should the APC lose this election we can only adduce it to “ Whoever Allah guides, no one can misguide, and whoever Allah misguides, no one can guide.” - the kind of message that sooner or later could be causing Peter Obi and not dear Bola Ahmed Tinubu to be “weeping and gnashing his teeth”. And, of course, “he who laughs last, laughs best”
Here, where only hard facts can demystify the questions is, with 93.4 million Nigerians eligible to vote and with a few million over-eighteen-year-old Almajiris eligible, who has got them registered, who has been promising to make them all of them millionaires, and who is going to reap a marvellous harvest of the Almajiri votes?
The following sentence occurs in a few places in the Holy Bible: And darkness covered the land. Thankfully, that does not refer to Nigeria, even if it is a land in which Professors of Electricity produce darkness only. - even if we have Ojogbon usually producing light upon light. You read that right and you can find those exact words here: “Professors of electricity who produce darkness only”
Shit happens. It’s sad; tragic. Nothing to laugh about and obviously it could have only been at a moment of extreme stress that dogs many people on the campaign trail, that dear Bola found himself in a state of incoherence when with the best of intentions, trying to recite al-Fatiha which every pious Muslim recites in daily prayer, at least seventeen times a day, every day and which even mere parrots can recite. We can and should only sympathise and commiserate with him about this little enemy attack from Iblis, and that’s why before commencing anything, including the recitation of al-Fatiha, we say, A'udhu billahi min ash-shaytaan-ir-rajeem
Lastly, since the field has been evened out now that it’s a four-horse race, there is a greater likelihood that there will be a runoff if none of the candidates can win a clear victory in the first round - Peter Obi obviously is not going to be reaping any rich dividends in the Islamic areas, nor are Bola Tinubu, Atiku, and honest broker Rabiu Kwankwaso going to do spectacularly in the Igbo South East. No one seems to have the necessary spread to cover the 25% in two-thirds of the states as required and that means that a runoff is likely. So this runoff is going to be between who and who? It’s three weeks to go and we’d like to know…
World newspapers: Nigeria