In his eye-opening article Reuben Abati, media aide of ex-president Goodluck Jonathan, describes six lessons that Nigeria has learnt as democratic country.
The greatest residue of our democracy in the last 16 years (1999–2015), I think, is the manner in which our community has been enriched by lessons that have practically changed our lives. The democratic deficit is less than the gain; for us, democracy is essentially liberative and should endure.
It is partly the reason why no matter the observed shortcomings of the five-month old Buhari administration, the Nigerian people remain optimistic about their belief in the viability of the democratic option. They know that they have been empowered in such a manner that succeeding governments will always be held accountable to the electorate. Thus, democracy has reframed the national dialogue and the people’s expectations.
1. Nigerian people secured victory against a military establishment
In 1999, with the return to civilian rule, the Nigerian people secured victory against a military establishment, which had exercised political authority, formally and informally, for about 33 years.
They fought for six years to insist on democracy and the people’s right to choose. Sixteen years later, after many seasons of trial, we have reached a point in our romance with democracy, whereby no other form of government appeals to us. It is clear to every discerning person that only democratic rule is now acceptable to Nigerians. For it has shown us, how powerful we can possibly be. No other event has proven this to be true, more concretely than the last general elections.
It should not be lost on Nigerians, the significance of the removal from office of an incumbent President. In 2015, the power of the vote turned the Nigerian voter into the ultimate political authority, resulting in a greater sense of public ownership of the democratic enterprise. He or she knows that elected representatives can be held accountable through the ballot box.
2. The third term agenda of Obasanjo
Secondly, in 2005, an attempt was made to bypass the Nigerian Constitution and extend to a third term, the tenure of the then incumbent President. This alleged plan against the people was to have been hatched with the imprimatur of the national legislature, but again the people rose against the planned subterfuge. Pierre Nkurunziza may have succeeded in executing the same anti-people ploy in Burundi, and Paul Kagame may be toying with it in Rwanda, but it is not the kind of folly that anyone will ever try again in Nigeria and hope to succeed.
The people have learnt that those in positions of power at the highest level may not be trusted to respect the laws of the land or the oath of office they took. Having stopped one former president from transforming into a monarch, the phrase – third term remains in our political lexicon, a reminder of what is constitutionally unacceptable.
3. The implications of the health of Nigerian leaders
Third lesson: Nigerians have become very conscious of the implications of the health of their leaders for the stability of the polity.
They were taught that lesson during the three-year rule of late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua. At the time, the key subject was the mortality of the president. From that point onwards, any sign that a potential president could be nursing a terminal disease became a major campaign issue.
President Yar’Adua’s death threw up other sub-lessons about the supremacy of the Constitution and the right of other Nigerians to aspire to the highest office in the land, but the people would have preferred to have him healthily alive and not to have a Presidency dominated by morbidity and remembered, and excused, largely on that score. It is therefore not surprising that in the last elections, physical fitness and mortality became key issues of campaign.
4. Any citizen whoever he or she may be, can aspire to be the president
With his emergence as Nigerian President in 2010, Goodluck Jonathan laid to rest the myth that to occupy that office, the candidate must be a person of privilege. His parents were ordinary folk. He was himself like the guy next door; his life a replica of the life of any struggling Nigerian of his age who had attended university, gone through national service, hustled for employment and was like the rest of us.
Hitherto, Nigerian leaders had elite connections or bearings and they wielded authority as if it was their birthright to do so. This claim to leadership birthright is now a subject of inquiry. It explains why in the last general elections, it became clear to all and sundry that there are now certain minimum standards being set nationwide in terms of personal attributes, experience and exposure with regard to public office.
5. The moral bar of our democratic process
Fifth lesson: when President Goodluck Jonathan conceded victory to President Buhari after the 2015 elections, he raised the moral bar of our democratic process. Nigerians have taken to heart the fact that the people have the power to change a sitting government at all levels and that the power of incumbency even at the centre is at the mercy of the electorate.
These days, it is not unusual to find an average Nigerian of voting age holding an elected person accountable and swearing that any form of misconduct will be questioned.
Good news! What prevails in Nigeria today therefore is not merely voter confidence; it is best described as voter arrogance or voter dictatorship.
6. Nigerians have learnt to ask for accountability
Sixth lesson, and this is probably the most important. Nigerians have learnt after 16 years of democratic rule not to place implicit trust in politicians without asking for accountability. They know that professional politicians are capable of lies, they deceive, they over-promise in order to secure their mandate, and also, that there are no true saints in power-ville. They are also learning that election campaign is different from governance, that governance is complex, politics is treacherous, and that politicians will say anything to win the votes and get into power. A corollary lesson: to resolve the cleavages that trouble Nigeria and render institutions ineffectual, government must be effective and our democracy must become more liberal and less of a mechanism for class formation and ethnic competition.
Five months of reverse ratiocination by the Buhari administration should make that clear even to the most naive. The people should also know that politicians have no differences on matters of self-interest; and they choose to exploit our many fault lines to achieve their objectives.
Nigerian politics is therefore not about ideology or principles; it is about power and who gets into the arena. But the people have also learnt one more thing: that change is possible, no matter the shape.
Reuben Abati, born November 7, 1965 in Abeokuta, Ogun state, was special adviser on media and publicity to ex-president Goodluck Jonathan. He was previously a newspaper columnist and the chairman of the editorial board of the Nigerian newspaper The Guardian from 2001 to 2011.
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