By UGO ONUOHA
THE victory lap is on. It has actually been on since May 29, 2023, when this regime assumed office. We are 48 hours away from the regime of Nigeria’s president, Alhaji Bola Ahmed Tinubu, clocking two years in office. For all practical purposes, he is halfway through his tenure. He is constitutionally qualified, in the Nigerian context, to seek a second term in 2027. Though not supported by the evidence before us in terms of delivery of promises, the chorus from his echo chamber has been that the next presidential election will be a no contest, a walkover or a stroll in the park. But some other Nigerians are insistent that Tinubu, in spite of defections, deflections and contrived bandwagon by some opposition politicians, will end up as OTP or one term president.
This group says that their conviction about OTP for Tinubu is borne out by his glaring failures midway into his tenure. While the pro-Tinubu camp is pinning their hopes on his reelection on his bogus achievements and contrived popularity, as well as the notorious recurring electoral heists in our country, the opposing team believes that it cannot be business as usual and that the president must swim or sink on the strength of his performance in four years. And if the midterm scorecard is any yardstick then Tinubu should be prepared for a fierce headwind in the run up to the 2027 general election.
Victory lap comes in different dimensions and contexts. For our purposes today and with particular reference to the rulership of the All Progressives Congress (APC) political party we will dwell on the cultural angle.
The cultural angle of the ongoing awkward victory lap by the APC is supposed to symbolize achievement, triumph, and hard work. It might as well be for the APC apparatchiks. But is that the experience and reality of the majority of our people? I will leave that judgement call to Nigerians as individuals.
Another cultural significance of a victory lap is the celebration of successes so as to inspire others to strive for similar achievements. What achievements in this midterm report card is the ruling party celebrating that are worthy of emulation – poor and deteriorating public utilities and infrastructure; debilitating energy deficits; worsening insecurity; in-your-face pillaging of the public till (including the recent announcement of the shutting down of the Port Harcourt refinery for maintenance barely six months after re-streaming it and after expending $1.5bn on repairing the same refinery); failed educational system which high-point is the about 20 million out of school children, deepening poverty, among other troubling indexes of the country.
Ostensibly, as part of the victory lap about 22 governors, (ironically about the same number of the then ruling PDP governors endorsed former President Goodluck Jonathan ahead of the 2015 election which he eventually lost), of the APC including governors who shamelessly absconded with the mandate of the electorate which they received on the platform of another political party, converged on Abuja last Thursday to adopt Tinubu as their sole presidential candidate for an election that’s still about two years away. To be sure the congregants acted within their rights. But by so doing they also betrayed anxiety that all is not well in the APC in spite of the bravado of their invincibility. We have witnessed similar posturing in the past. A former ruling party, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), once vowed that it would remain in power at the centre for a minimum of 60 unbroken years. Where’s the PDP today barely 10 years after losing power? Nowhere. It is castrated. It is impotent. It is gasping for breath. It is fractionalized. Its governors who are the funders of the party given our peculiar political party structure are leaving the party in droves for the ruling APC. It is alive only in name, and remnants of its once imperial glory. The self-styled largest political party in Africa is virtually extinct. It’s a shell which has been hollowed out. If the PDP which at inception remotely resembled a proper political party is currently facing this tragic fate, it will only be left to the imagination what will become of the APC which was a special purpose vehicle (SPV) cobbled together to deliver the presidency of Nigeria to Tinubu. Yes, I can hear you say that it first delivered the presidency to a once eternal presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, who turned out to be a blight on the country. But I know that you know better than that. APC was for Tinubu. Still is. Buhari, the affliction of Nigeria, was used to test the vehicle because of his provincial cult following, and to smoothen the rough edges of the SPV. So the test of the APC will be after the tenure of its owner, Tinubu, in 2027 or 2031 or whenever Nigerians say that they have had enough of the apostle of “emi lo Kan”, a corrosive and corruptive slogan that has become the USP (unique selling proposition) of this regime.
The APC hegemons and sundry subscribers know, or should know what governance is, but we will remind them since they have chosen selective amnesia. For good governance to be acknowledged in a democratic jurisdiction of which we pretend to be one, there must be a manifest presence of a responsible and responsive leadership, efficient and transparent management of resources, credible institutions, and policies that promote the well-being of citizens. Leaders, (in contrast to rulers), and institutions should be seen to be accountable to citizens for every action and decision; decision – making processes and information about same should be open, transparent, accessible, and understandable; citizens should have opportunities and platforms to participate in decision – making processes and contribute to policy formulation and their implementation. And also critical to good governance is the upholding of the rule of law over and above individuals and institutions no matter how highly placed they may be. Good governance promotes equity, fairness, and justice as well as ensures that all citizens have reasonable access to resources and opportunities. If these are a few manifestations of good governance, then how does the APC measure up in the last 10 years it has been in power at the centre, and in a majority of the sub-nationals? And to drill it down, how well has the regime of Tinubu performed halfway into his tenure? In the four years of the immediate past administration of the US president, Joe Biden, his government created over 16 million jobs. I will be the first person to accept that this will amount to an unfair comparison given the level and sophistication of the American economy against Nigeria’s. However, the expectation is that “nwanza ga agba obara nga oha”. Instead of creating jobs, no matter how little, Tinubu thus far and through his ill-digested policies and programmes, has presided over millions of job losses and the fleeing of transnational corporations from our country. Some estimate that the APC has presided over the killing of between 4-7 million companies in Nigeria in its decade-long rule or better still misrule.
At his inauguration in 2023 after a fiercely disputed and controversial election and its voodoo result, Tinubu promised, among other things, that the funds that would be saved by removing petrol subsidy which he did that day would be channeled into better investments to improve public infrastructure, education, healthcare, and job creation. Specifically on jobs, he promised to create one million new jobs in the digital economy for Nigerian youths. At the midterm junction and in spite of his bogus victory lap, there’s no evidence of any such achievement. The only thing remotely close to digital job is the creation or retention of a ministry that has digital attached to its name. He also vowed that security would be at the top of his agenda. According to him, neither prosperity nor justice could prevail amidst insecurity and violence. But in spite of the posturing of the national security adviser, Malam Nuhu Ribadu, the security situation of the country has further deteriorated on Tinubu’s watch. Terrorism has moved from the streets to our homes. Nigerians live in perpetual fear for their, and dear, lives. In addition, this regime has exacerbated the country’s faultlines and has put a severe stress on national cohesion through its brazen nepotistic appointments to key offices in the security, economic and financial sectors. And this is despite the fact that at inauguration Tinubu had called for national unity and healing from previous feuds. He had promised that his administration’s mission would be to nurture humanity and encourage compassion toward one another. So, measured on the strength of his promises, Tinubu so far has failed. And he cannot do any better because he is fully immersed and invested in the politics of reelection to the detriment of governance. Or whatever was construed as governance in the first two years of his happening to Nigeria.
Part of the dubious achievements of this regime so far is the art of borrowing from our children. The irony is that the regime is adept at projecting. Some weeks ago, this regime claimed that part of the problems it was confronted with was that the previous administrations did not spare any thoughts for the well-being of future generations of Nigerians. Really? This came from a president who is in the forefront of borrowing from our children. And borrowing in a manner that gives the impression that borrowing was about to go out of fashion. In the lifespan of this regime thus far Nigeria’s public debt has soared from N87.38 trillion in the second quarter of 2023 to approximately N135.5 trillion as at December 31, 2024. The additional debt stock for the first five months of this year has not been included. We must say that one of the things Tinubu should not be accused of is providing leadership and governance for Nigeria. Because he has not done so. He runs Nigeria as a personal business and treats Nigerians as customers. For him governance is buying and selling. If the government is not making profit from the sale of petrol, impose tax at the pump head. If the cash register is not raking in surplus revenue to the government from public power supply, tax the consumers and categorise them into meaningless bands. If the regime is low on revenue, expand the tax net to squeeze water from stone by making unprofitable businesses and unemployed individuals pay to subsidize a profligate regime.
Everybody is supposed to make sacrifices and tighten their belts except our rulers. They indulge in luxuries and hedonism. Tinubu sets the tone with a well appointed presidential jet and an armour – plated US custom-made Escalade limousine. The occupant of the office of the first lady which is not known to the constitution cruises around in foreign made SUVs worth billions of Naira. At our expense. The same applies to lawmakers at all levels. For them domestic substitutes for their official vehicles are infradig and degrading and unacceptable. Even some local government chairmen have joined the bazaar. For this regime optics count for nothing. And that’s simply because our rulers hold us in utter contempt. They will roll out the drums for celebrations because we do not matter. The most important score is the one they award themselves no matter how unseemly and grotesque it looks.
Ugo Onuoha, veteran journalist, was the Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief, Champion Newspapers Limited.
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