Buhari, Amaechi and politics of ‘parallel govt’

on January 05, 2015  

By Adamu Gwazuwang
THE Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, obviously regards himself as the head of a mob of urban protesters, given his recent action at the Police Headquarters, Abuja the other day, where he faced a rowdy APC barricade in the premises in his bid to deliver a protest letter to the IGP. Earlier at a rally, the governor had promised “civil disobedience” and “parallel government” as premeditated APC response to an unfavourable outcome of the 2015 elections. He appeared to care less about the ominous consequences of such anarchy.
Amaechi has endorsed “the right to mutiny” for aggrieved members of the military forces, a direct contempt of the trial of a batch of soldiers for mutiny in the war against Boko Haram. Ironically, the governor is now speaking as campaign manager of General Muhammadu Buhari who was a victim of a mutiny of sorts in 1985 when the Babangida palace coup ousted him from power. The continuing promotion of mayhem and anarchy as the preferred alternative option for APC should it fail to win the 2015 presidential election by the governor and the tacit endorsement by the APC leadership caucus which handed over the Buhari Campaign to him does not augur well for the “progressive” posturing of the APC and indeed the future of democracy in Nigeria.
Future of democracy
Though General Buhari is making a fourth attempt to rule Nigeria as a civilian president, he is still counting his military career as an asset rather than a liability, seeing how he often boasts of a strategy to end the BH insurgency as soon as he gets elected which leaves many wondering why a retired army general of his calibre needs also to be a civilian president before he can don his hanging khaki and head for the north-east to save the lives of hundreds of fellow citizens. But the real teaser is whether Amaechi’s promotion of mutiny in the military can really help Buhari’s political cause.
Amaechi obviously has more at stake in the outcome of the 2015 presidential elections than the General can ever imagine. At least Buhari has recognized that there can be only one Nigeria, warts and all, and that remaining together as Nigerians to “salvage it together” is the way forward. The governor’s doomsday forecasts certainly reflect his desperation about the uncertain, if not bleak future should the APC contraption collapse on impact with the 2015 polls. At best he would remain the fire-spitting mouthpiece of a muted campaign organization as the focus moves from losers to winners.

Rotimi Amaechi

Today he does not even have the assurance of a comfortably sitting governor with Wike literally whacking him out of office at the end of term and tenure. Four years out of power and, therefore, out of reckoning must be an unbearable prospect for him to contemplate and he would rather instigate a chaotic implosion of the democratic dispensation where everyone else would join him in the losers’ lurch than face the looming reality of backing the wrong horse.
He is not alone in this paradoxical predicament of despondency in high office. General Buhari as a fourth time presidential aspirant has long ago fallen prey to this peculiar dementia as he keeps disbelieving the stark reality of his in-electability as far as pan-Nigerian, cross-cultural and multi-religious acceptability goes in today’s and tomorrow’s Nigeria. Even when in 2011 he wept profusely and swore never to aspire again, it was not a deep-rooted conviction but a momentary rendezvous with remorse that soon retreated with a little hypocritical help from his so-called supporters who are as clueless as their hero about anything outside core-northern interest. With Buhari barking threats of dog-and-baboon showdown to fire up the riotous ranks of his fellow travellers, the impression that Buhari is also idolised all over the country is only reinforced in gullible minds.
So they are misled to believe the only way Buhari and his APC mishmash of mangled failed politicians can be losers is when the elections are rigged, oblivious to the bigger picture of Buhari as a regional and sectarian political icon! And the politics of hypocrisy and deceit continue to wreak havoc on the overriding national interest of Nigerians to the point where even Nigeria becomes a sacrificial lamb on the altar of Buharism.
Amaechi is in good company of the bad examples of Nigerian politics that throng the APC with a fixed and frenzied focus on ruling Nigeria at all costs so they can populate the corridors of power with their parasitic predatory prejudices that push the sense of purpose and patriotic zeal of nationalistic development-oriented leadership to the background.
Now it is the last bastion of Nigeria’s sovereignty and cohesion in the armed forces that are being dragged into the mud of ambitious self-serving politics of power without responsibility. The military is a unique national institution all over the world that is established and sustained by special laws and regulations aimed at protecting and preserving the spirit of national consciousness by undertakings of unconditional loyalty and unwavering commitment among its gallant rank and file. Mutiny is anathema in the military just as “civil disobedience” is taboo in civilized countries. Nigeria is greater than the bandwagon of anarchists riding APC’s train to oblivion. Nigeria will be here long after their despicable advocacy and blind quest for power become history!
Adamu Gwazuwang wrote from Abuja.
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