The impeachment of former President Bill Clinton proceeded apace mainly because he had until then, on the record flatly denied any inappropriate liaisons with Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern and jailbait. Clinton did not just get in trouble for cheating on his spouse or for having a sexual relationship with Ms Lewinsky but for his highly televised public denial of it. To a puritanical America, that rankled to no end and something had to give to make the point that Clinton’s denials (not his runaway libido) smacked of pathological lack of remorse for an un-presidential conduct. So, instead of what might have been a routine congressional censure for being caught with his hands in the cookie jar, Clinton’s pursuers seized on his lack of remorse to arraign him for high crimes and misdemeanors. Even to ordinary decent folks, lack of remorse meant that Clinton was totally bereft of the capacity for rehabilitation, thus making closure impossible for the moral majority. A situation that also made his defense extremely onerous and constituted a moral burden for his most ardent supporters and spin-doctors until Clinton recanted by finally admitting to America that he did have an inappropriate sexual relationship with Lewinsky and that he was sorry for his attempts to deny it. An outraged America suddenly relented, and the Senate just came shy of confirming the impeachment. Clinton was thus freed to live out the rest of his presidency as a lame duck, but he is now widely acclaimed to have been one of the best Presidents America produced in her entire history. Had he not been saved by remorse, his impeachment could have become final and like Nixon, who lost out for lacking remorse, Clinton would have been bound for post-office pariah status and obscurity. 

Remorse is a powerful emotion or recompense that drives or detracts from the quantum of human response to injustice or other injurious conduct. It can be the lone shield for avoiding revenge for a simple act of marital misconduct to the worst crimes imaginable, including even genocide. It is a phenomenon that has been deployed throughout human history to balm frayed nerves and help in the effort to reduce the human predilection for revenge or driving a nail for any nail driven. South Africans created its Truth and Reconciliation Commission as a forum for mass and public confession of guilt or public rendering of remorse and therefore the only hope for the nation to heal and contain the gathering storm of revenge that could have erupted from the victimized black majority. After half a century, the Japanese have somewhat brought closure to Korea for the despicable 2^nd World War-era state-tolerated crime of forced prostitution of Korean women that immensely wounded the national pride of Koreans. And in Nigeria, the Oputa Commission was where Nigerians, victims and persecutors alike, came face to face in an atmosphere pervaded by confession, remorse and reconciliation on the many troubling human rights violations that traumatized Nigerians in recent times. On George Bush versus Al Gore, the Democrats aggressively pressed their case for ballot recount partly because Bush had dithered on admitting to irregularities in Florida but once he came off his high horse to acknowledge them, Gore conceded victory to him and offered his congratulations. And America was saved from a looming constitutional crisis of first impression. Thus, remorse makes it likely that offenses perfectly fit for vigorous prosecution and stiff penalties often got forgiven, partly because perpetrators came forward with a public display of their contrition. In other words, remorse makes it possible for society to have a new compact of sorts that similar wrongs will never be perpetrated again. 

As applied to the last general elections in Nigeria, remorse was present in good quantity by all men and women of goodwill. Much of what went down and the key actors other than President Yar’Adua and Professor Iwu were hardly noticed in its diplomatic content but it was present anyway. It did not emanate from only those who might have done so out of a feeling of guilt or embarrassment for being the purveyors or beneficiaries of the electoral flaws but also by all well-meaning Nigerians and friends of Nigeria domiciled at home and in the Diaspora. In my small way as the Convener of Organization of Nigerian Lawyers in Diaspora (ONLID), I became part of a high-level unclassified meeting convened with Senator Russ Feingold on the subject of America’s combative response to the election outcome. The meeting occurred at the Congressional office of the powerful Senator at the Capitol Hills on April 27, 2007, and also present with me to help press Nigeria’s case were Attorneys Bruce Fein and Lloyd Ukwu. Bruce Fein is of The Lichfield Group, a government relations firm in Washington DC and formerly an Assistant Attorney-General of the United States in the Reagan Administration. Lloyd Ukwu is of the Law Group International in Washington DC and is a native Nigerian US-based attorney with a vast international practice that spans three continents. My own modest resume is similar to that of these two fine senior lawyers and we found common bond in our collective feeling of vicarious remorse stemming from the election irregularities and our concerns for what the future portends for Nigeria vis-à-vis her bilateral relations with the United States. The pressing necessity for meeting with the Senator was based on our understanding of America’s traditional policy of looking first to the Senate Sub-Committee on Africa for feelers before formulating America’s diplomatic response to hot-button issues like election irregularities in Africa’s emerging democracies. We sensed the uncanny absence of an official diplomatic damage-control on the part of Nigeria, and therefore decided on our own volition to move quickly before any harmful policy could take root. What was at stake was legion, including possible loss of stature conferred on Nigeria by America’s goodwill and portent threats to the critical investment dollars Nigeria must attract to sustain her economic reforms and stay away from usurious new loans. On that day, all three of us unremunerated, self-appointed diplomats wore the toga of hard-driving pro bono lobbyists, not for the PDP, President Yar’Adua or even the Nigerian government, but for Nigeria and her wonderful citizens. Lloyd and I were primarily driven by an instinctive love of motherland Nigeria, and Bruce is our mutual friend, admires Nigeria and like Senator Feingold, he was Jewish to boot (if you know what I mean). And it was to the marginal advantage of Nigeria that we were respected enough to be permitted room to maneuver our way through the many gauntlets ordinarily encountered before such high-level forum that could sway or water down US policy is granted.  

Therefore, our common cause was to protect Nigeria’s broader interests in the near term, and as regards Senator Feingold’s office, we might have accomplished the mission by simply demonstrating remorse for the shoddiness of the elections. So, much like President Yar’Adua did, we freely and genuinely acknowledged the allegations of electoral flaws, warts and all, and we did so with much hand-wringing and sense of outrage. But we then argued for America to reconsider her threats of sanctions and look to the independence and sagacity of Nigeria’s judiciary to satisfactorily resolve any dispute that might ensue. We submitted a two-page position paper to Senator Feingold, mainly pointing to elements that held prospects for better conduct of future elections and highlighting (then President-elect) Yar’Adua’s priors as a man of honor to be trusted to see the sense in ensuring that Nigeria will do much better next time around. To the Senator’s office, the fact that we were seen to be apolitical meant that we must be credible. All these while we felt sorry for all candidates whose electoral chances got ruined by a tacky process. Spent but upbeat, we departed Capitol Hills with the impression that we made a small but highly effectual impact. Then, after President Yar’Adua spoke up to the world and got most people to believe that he also was troubled (or remorseful), America began to come around. He demonstrated credibility (or rehabilitation) by calling for a Government of National Unity (GNU) and constituting a body to show the way to reforming the electoral process in Nigeria. Back in America, policymakers noted to Yar’Adua’s credit that Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, one of the major contenders for the presidency and a man highly respected in America waived his party’s right of petition and exhibited an uncommon sense of sportsmanship and patriotism by giving his nod to GNU, thus conferring the initial legitimacy Yar’Adua so much desired. And since then, the rest of President Yar’Adua’s body language shows that he means well. Therefore, it seems fair to state that a genuinely remorseful President Yar’Adua is the best bet yet that there is hope for Nigeria’s emerging democracy, with some allowances made for the institutional dysfunctions that still stalk the polity. This was good enough for me to finally have some closure on the presidential election, and I am sure this is true of most people, including an understandably cynical America. 

Aloy Ejimakor is on the board of Habitat & Health International Fund and on the Team of Alcalde-Fay, The Lichfield Group & Law Group. Washington, DC alloylaw@yahoo.com