When news hit the air recently that China has produced and launched Nigeria’s own first satellite in space, there was hardly any sense of jubilation in Nigeria. No doubt, several other developing countries would have received this news with a sense of national pride and at worst, suppressed euphoria. The absence of such emotions in Nigeria may sound natural and not be regarded as anything out of the ordinary given the urgency of other problems confronting the nation at the present stage in the history of its existence. True, as this may be though, there is definitely far more beneath the surface than meets the eyes.

It does not take a political expert these days to read the boiling temperature on the surface of Nigeria’s political waters. A huge portion of the Nigerian population split between the common man and the intellectual elite is overtly aggrieved and irate at the topmost figure of political leadership. The most widely hated President in the history of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is thus none other than the serving President whose tenure expires in approximately one week. While the common man is largely aggrieved at the absence of the basic amenities of life like water, electricity and good roads, the educated elite is a hybrid of legitimately aggrieved analysts, political propagandists, and outright enemies of the ruling establishment.

The reasons for the widespread hatred of the current ruling establishment centered around the President Olusegun Obasanjo has been exhaustively analyzed umpteen times in several media. Indeed, I have personally advanced several analyses in several forums and on numerous instances. I have explicitly outlined the outright failures of the regime of Olusegun Obasanjo in his eight years in power. I have also tried to position his achievements against his failures in a desperate attempt to arouse the sense of objectivity and balanced assessment in our intellectuals. Unfortunately however, I found myself being pushed into the corner of an apologist, the more I tried. All in a world, in which only condemnation is credible and presentable. I have simply come to understand that the most minimal rule of fairness and objectivity requiring the beholder to swap vintage points of observation and see a minimum of two sides just does not hold sway when the issue is Obasanjo. Inaccessible holders of destroy-it-all opinions will simply pick out what they choose.

The tenor is: “nothing good has, will and should ever come out of the man named Olusegun Obasanjo.” The engine of denial is then set in motion. Virtually unstoppable. Friends and enemies all agree on where the President has failed. The President too. In one interview, the President admitted having underestimated the systemic decay in the energy establishment when he took office in 1999. He is on record as saying that it took him three good years to get to the bottom of the NEPA problem. On the crucial issue at least, the President was honest. That inefficiency and corruption played its role in one issue or the other is just another matter. That has been the case with the nation named Nigeria since day 1 of its inception. But that doesn’t matter to committed detractors. At the end of the day, all the achievements of the President are virtually being denied.

Such few enemies of the President as are fair enough to touch on any single issue in the semblance of achievement is also quick to trivialize it and flush it down the sewage track of nonentity.

Statistics like the one released very lately, by the Governor of the Central Bank Chukwuma Soludo means absolutely nothing to detractors. They will never care to consider the state of Nigeria as Obasanjo left it in 1980, the state in 1999 and the state it is in, today. In the figures released by the Central Bank’s governor, per capita income in Nigeria in 1980 stood at $2,262.68. In 1990, it stood at $699.59. At the time Obasanjo took over power in 1999 for the second time, the figure had slumped to $463.23 per head.

In simplified terms, Per capita income is nothing other than the amount that each individual would receive in cash if the yearly income generated by a country from its productive activities were divided equally among every citizen. The economic index in this field has been showing a steady growth since 1999. In 2003, it soared to $621.15 and to $673.01 in the year 2004. For the first time however, the index has shown this figure crossing the thousand dollar threshold. As of December 31^st 2006, per capita income in Nigeria is reported as $1,011.73.

That China has reportedly developed and launced Nigeria’s first satellite into space is by now, no more news to every household in Nigeria. The trouble however, is that enemies of the President would rather have prefered such a feat achieved by Atiku Abubakar, his estranged deputy rather than have the name Obasanjo associated with anything positive! Anything good out of Obasanjo is almost tantamount to a curse that needs unravelling in the eyes of such detractors. All said and done! But the feat has been achieved. What is left but a grudging acceptance of the inevitable truth. Then what we hear is “A good achievement but…”! The accustomed songs of electricity, water supply and bad roads are recited. Every literate Nigerian with the slightest gift of written expression has simply mutated into some competent prophet of relativism in advancing the course of spin-mastery. The hypocrisy is contained in the absence of objectivity. The supremacy of hate-born fanaticism. In the end, this is badly compromised by the non-deniability of the obvious. The end-result is the dilemma of accepting a feat for what it is or submerging deeper in the delusion of deniability. It is simply the dilemma in hypocrisy.

Somehow, I belong to a dwindling minority of Nigerians who try to understand the current President of Nigeria not in his private capacity as Olusegun Obasanjo with his sometimes, unpalatable temperamental outbursts or his lack of the natural gift of eloquence and verbal expressionism, which is sometimes characterized by his critics as a disgrace unworthy of the Presidency. On the contrary, I try to understand the private person Olusegun Obasanjo in his capacity as President of Nigeria with a programmatic appeal to get the acts of a Nation together, that has been trampled upon over years of successive misrule. Today, a large majority of analytical Nigerians have become self-styled valuation experts in the portrayal of the legacy of the outgoing President.

Many have deviced diverse and random methods of assessment ranging from the Table of Jericho to the classroom rating instinct of Zebbrudayas! They are always betrayed however, by one single element: the inherent and inadvertently manifesting subjective whims and caprices to higlight a negative outcome in the guise of objectivity.

Historical legacies however, are hardly ever determined by subjective perceptions. Historical legacies are always charactized by such traits as are distinctively out of the ordinary. While history remembers the late Murtala Mohammed amongst his peers for his bold reforms and well-meant puritanist purge of the civil service, Sani Abacha is down in history as being the most brutal dictator Nigeria has ever had. Yakubu Gowon is remembered for the Udoji bonus. Whatever these men did, it was the first of its kind. There is virtually nothing for which History remembers Shehu Shagari, save the commencement of the acquisition of foreign debts – because a large part of his pattern of governance hardly diverted from the ordinary, accustomed elements of Nigerianism. Ummaru Dikko’s symbolization of corruption was nothing new to Nigeria. Neither was incompetence nor the widely acclaimed “You chop, I chop” mentality.

Why critical Nigerians now believe that Olusegun Obasanjo will be largely remembered for poor electricity, bad roads, water-supply, corruption and election rigging is still a mystery to my understanding of socio-political trends.

While socio-political failures have a lot in stock for the President, there will hardly be any objective Sociologist that will dispute the fact that Obasanjo’s milestone achievements have more in stock for the historical archives than his widely perceived negative records.

Objective or not, no archive will deny Obasanjo’s record-braking negative perception amongst the citizenry. The President will definitely hold the record of the most widely hated leader Nigeria has ever had. Unfortunate for his detractors however, I will dare a sociological/political scientific research five years after Obasanjo’s departure to investigate what he is remembered for.

Aside fom being the first military ruler to have handed over power to an elected civilian government in 1980, and being the first civilian President to have handed over power to another civilian President that is fraudulently elected the typical Nigerian way, history will hold a lot of superlatives for Obasanjo. There is a chain of “first-dos” that will be attributable to the President. A chain of achievments that are far from the accustomed elements of routine Nigerian governance. Heading the first administration to have combated the burden of foreign debt. The introduction of a diversified telephone system. The overhaul of the banking system. The launching of Nigeria’s first satellite. These are all elements for which history will archive the achievements of President Obasanjo. There are a lot more though that history books will touch upon in details, but these are not facts that the ordinary man will know a lot about. For instance the phrase ‘economic reform’ entailing less government involvement in the free market in some sectors, which was started under Obasanjo and is clearly admired by foreign creditors in granting debt-relief, by investors in coming to the Niger Delta despite the risk of kidnapping etc., etc. does not mean a thing except merely talking some technical gobbledygook for the ordinary Nigerian.

The first President after Obasanjo that will solve the problem of electricity, water and road communications, will have ended up doing something that Nigerians have never known for several decades and will thus go down in history, as the great achiever.

There are clear indications that Obasanjo’s secret desire of also being the first President to have achieved all these infrastructural feats clearly informed his quest for a third term in office. Precisely this loophole defines the opportunity and the burden to be inherited by the President-elect Musa Umaru Yar A’dua.

Today, classical political programs that are usual in traditional democracies do not and cannot apply in Nigeria. There is hardly any program a political party can present to Nigerians aside from electricity, water supply and good roads. The point in time in which these problems of infrastructure are solved and power, water supply and good roads become routine reality in Nigeria will mark the defining moment of politics of morals and ethics in the Nigerian landscape. Then, Nigerians can credibly focus on political programs of economic growth, national pride and social order. Then, Nigerians can begin to credibly demand a credible, transparent and functional electoral system, a better channel of public complaint etc.

It is the absence of basic amenities that is precisely making a laughing stock of several hypocritical benchmarks of assessing Obasanjo’s achievements. A nation without power supply seeking to implement a system of electronic voting and also taking itself so seriously at that with the cry of fraud and foul is nothing but a nation in a state of self-denial.

The naked status of many facts being so badly intertwined in the perception and judgment of the Nigerian reality is one bitter pill that hypocritical adversaries of the current President will have to swallow in their glaring dilemma!

Robot  Villager

# 1 var sbtitle3879=encodeURIComponent(The Dilemma...Read the full article. Posted by Robot| 21.05.2007 16:13

Auspicious  Villager

# 2 Mr. Frisky Larrimore, Sir! You are gradually sinking to the same depth that those whom you criticize are. This piece is loaded with exergerrations about those whom you consider Olusegun Obasanjo's foes, whereas the truth is, while some of their agitation is genuine, their threat to the little good that exists of Obasanjo's Legacy is immaterial. I still remember your very first article here on NVS. It was more balanced than what subsists lately. It appears that in defending yourself against those who cannot objectively appraise your pieces, you have allowed yourself to be pushed through the wall and now you resort to the same tactics of exergerration that they employ when criticizing Obasanjo. Now, you are beginning to sound aggreived yourself - like a victim. I sense a pain in your piece. In the process of expressing your greiviances, you have began to praise Obasanjo like Paul Adujie does - as one with NO sin, who has done nothing wrong for the opposition to rile against him. Comments like "the most hated President in Nigerian history" are flying out of your fingers as you type. And here I wonder, did Frisky Larrymore frisk away Babangida and Abacha's history ni? While the memory of those two are loathed across the Motherland, Obasanjo evokes mixed reactions - strong reactions. He is definitely not "hated" across board as you insinuate in your piece. And those who hate him are as biased as people like Atiku (and Son of the Delta on NVS, for impeaching Alamiyesheigha "illegally"(!)) and the rest of them. This is NOT about Obasanjo's popularity. My point is, you are very much guilty of the things you accuse your "detractors" of in this piece. You fail to ignore the fact that there are many, many things that Nigerians genuinely would love to wringe Obasanjo's neck (like a Turkey!) for. Without Obasanjo, Fayose would never have happened in Ekiti, neither would the duo of Chris and Nnamdi Uba have happened in Awka. The list goes on. Suffice to say, Obasanjo lo ko awo opposition yen l'oro - Obasanjo it was who made wild animals of those who opposed him! Yes!!! How? By resorting to illegalities upon illegalities to outplay them, he emboldened them and gave them the ammo and a platform for them to come against him and rubbish whatever little legacies he was purports to build for himself and bequeathe Nigerians. One of the most devastating mistakes on Obasanjo's part was to gun for a Third Term, halfway through his tenure. Nothing in this world justifies that attempt at changing the rules of the game half-way through the game. It emboldened people like Atiku Abubakar, Babangida and others to come out singing "O Democracy we Love Thee!" It diminished the stature and Office of the President in the eyes who were previously skeptical about him. That and his other extra-legal activities won Atiku Abubakar and the rest of the people like him support from people who ordinarily, would never have stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Atiku. Your latest piece, for example, only serves to fuel the animosity against Mr. President the more, no doubt because of the exergerrations therein. People who are technically averse to the President style of leadership will take a more critical stand! Why should Nigerians be excited about the launch of a communications satellite when there is virtually NO security of life and property; when there is no power to run the equipments that depends on these satellites; when the roads are in horrible state of disrepair - including the one to the President's farm in Ota, which he doesn't travel upon since he commutes from MML to Ota by Helicopter? Nigerians are only human - THEY ARE NOT ANIMALS! They are intelligent and can see the through the cosmetics. That a few disgruntled loosers in the opposition parties are amongst those who criticize the government does not invalidate the genuiness of their protestations! We must always seperate the dissapointed average Haruna from the rest of those who lost out in the battle between the Gladiators.' Review your style, Mr. Larrimore. Don't get infected by the same thing that ails those whom you battle against. Consider that a friendly advice. Auspicious. Posted by Auspicious| 21.05.2007 16:52

Frisky Larr  Villager

# 3 Auspicious Sir, I guess, I agree with a large part of your submission even though it contains a little bit of exaggeration as well. I have a feeling that you also stand much on the middle ground with a bit more critical tone. I must confess that I attach less importance to the Adedibu, Andy Uba or Ngige issues and the like, because all other parties and politicians do the same as well. As I stated in the essay, I am indeed sick of reading aggrandized portrayal of failures and triviliazed portrayal of achievements. It is also sickening that no matter how objective you present the facts, critics of the President are always incapable of carrying out a well-meaning debate like you seem to do. That is the point in time in which you dont give a damn anymore what they would say or think. All that aside though, if there is much Nigerians would rather crucify Obasanjo for, those things for which he deserves to be given credit should not be perpetually trivialized. The final judge of course, will be posterity, not emotions. In any case, I am indeed grateful for your very friendly caution! In the absence of any extraordinary occurrence, this will probably be where I back out for good, on any OBJ-related issue! God bless Sir! Posted by Frisky Larr| 21.05.2007 17:41

ebasain  Villager

# 4 AUspicious, Like you said of Obasanjo, often times I too want to twist your neck! But right now I feel like taking you with me to Heaven! I think your critique nailed it squarely in the head. It was superb. I couldn't have written it any better. Simply put, Obasanjo's negatives just outweighed his positives. They say for whom much is given, much is exopected. In the history of Nigeria no one has been given the opportunity to lead the country more than Obasanjo has and with so much political capital. After 8 years, Nigerians are more wretced than they were in 1999. And that culmination of crass incompetence and greed hasn't gone down well with Nigerians. The Third Term Agenda and the elections of 2007 would no doubt define much of Obasanjo's legacy. Posted by ebasain| 21.05.2007 18:11

Yankari  Villager

# 5 In simple terms, whatever OBJ achieved in the past 8 years has been negated by his very many senseless and selfish actions. While poor roads, Nepa, security, might be major reasons for peoples hatred , my greatest gripe with him, is that he has delayed THE START of our road to greatness in Nigeria,( courtesy of his elections) by 4, possibly 8 years, and has again created needless agitation and uncertainty in the land with his elections If he had conducted sensible elections and given half decent people a chance of getting into power, perhaps people would have looked less angrilly at the past and focused more positively on the future Finally Frisky says he pays less attention to Adedibu or Andy Uba, the one question i have for such people is. If any of your relatives had lost their lives in the needless violence caused by these people i wonder if you would still be so flippant. Posted by Yankari| 21.05.2007 18:14

ebasain  Villager

# 6 Frisky, You don't worry that half of the state governors coming in the next four years did so by subverting the constitution of the country? You don't worry that Yar'Adua's government has no legitimacy around the world even if the west have hypocritically annnounced that they will 'work' with him? Given our status as the 'GIANT' of Africa, our illegitimate government doesn't bother you? Think beyond Obasanjo, think outside the box! Posted by ebasain| 21.05.2007 18:29

Palamedes  Villager

# 7 >>When news hit the air recently that China has produced and launched Nigeria’s own first satellite in space, there was hardly any sense of jubilation in Nigeria. How can you expect Nigerians to be jubilant over something that is remote from their daily life? It is simply failure in communication with the Nigerian people. The Nigerian people were not including in the process; they were not informed about the potential benefits of the satellite launch. Government officials should have gone to the broadcasting stations and newspapers six months before the launch to inform the people. From a smart political move, the missed opportunity shows how politically naïve our leaders are in not taking advantage of the launch to divert attention or even bury the bad news surrounding the tsunami of election. New of the launch could have been presented as the light at the end of a dark tunnel (i.e. election). >>Somehow, I belong to a dwindling minority of Nigerians who try to understand the current President of Nigeria not in his private capacity as Olusegun Obasanjo … On the contrary, I try to understand the private person Olusegun Obasanjo in his capacity as President of Nigeria with a programmatic appeal to get the acts of a Nation together, that has been trampled upon over years of successive misrule… I am afraid, much as I agree with your analysis of the hate mongers, I don’t think anyone outside the President's family or friends can know him in his private capacity. Beside, Nigerians are not interested in the private Olusegun Obasanjo but only as President and his leadership. One cannot deny that he has not tried his best but his best in eight years is not good enough. I do not think he has the leadership qualities. We automatically assume that because someone is a President, he or she therefore possesses leadership qualities. People with true leadership skills are as rare as genius. In my book, the only true leader with leadership skill is General Gowan, the rest are rather mediocre. And I am afraid that President-elect Musa Umaru Yar A’dua reminds me of Shehu Shagari – I hope that I am wrong. >>It is the absence of basic amenities that is precisely making a laughing stock of several hypocritical benchmarks of assessing Obasanjo’s achievements. A nation without power supply seeking to implement a system of electronic voting… This comes down to deficiency in leadership. He had vision but it is a vision that is based on Nice-to-have rather than Need-to-have. The former is luxury, the latter is necessity. Posted by Palamedes| 21.05.2007 19:37

toshmann  Villager

# 8 frisky, no matter how many space projects the country launches into the sky, if there are no basic services like roads, hospitals, water, power supply and security, one can NEVER say obasanjo did well. these are issues that affect everyday life of millions of nigerians and they are not available and you want them to rejoice over space crafts. some of them wont even be able to watch it on tv as there may be no power supply. first things first. you cannot see a 5 yr old child who is starving and start telling him of the importance of education and the need for a masters degree. NO. what he wants to hear is that there is food on the table, after that you can now talk of books. Or you want us to be like the former soviet union who were thought to be a great nation whereas its citizens were dying in poverty. that's not nation building. basic things we need in nigeria were not done in 8 yrs and you want us to praise obasanjo. the reforms are good. accepted. but we need a strong democracy, good social services and alleviated poverty to appreciate those reforms and dont forget, it is only when the citizens appreciate those reforms that we as a nation can come together and make them work. Posted by toshmann| 21.05.2007 19:56

SBI  Villager

# 9 There is no policy or project that was executed successfully by this outgoing regime, some of which the author has chosen to highlight as 'achievements', that was not motivated by an opportunity for cornering, misappropriation and purloining by the President and his school of Piranha cleverly masquerading as reformniks. Surprisingly, amidst these lofty achievements all other effort to utilize Nigeria's money for the greater benefit of the average Nigerian today and even for the the future failed woefully. Check: roads, crime, healthcare, education, power, local refineries, pensions, local debt, employment, mass transit, elections, political cohesion etc. So today you could say relatively, like Tanko Yakassai, that 8 years of Obasanjo was not a complete failure, depending on the condition of your stomach (since per capita income is rising) but 10 years down the line when the now 20 and 30 year olds begin to act like the leaders of today, their role models of the last 8 years, then we can judge the success of Obasanjo's leadership. SBI Posted by SBI| 21.05.2007 21:02

TEchi  Villager

# 10 Mr. Frisky Larrimore: I am glad we both agree that a starving people who do not have the basic necessities of life can not feel euphoric in the face of daily misery. We must also agree that the problem is obvious as expressed and nothing is hidden as you indicated. It does not require the complex theory of relativity to know what ails the average Nigerian. It is tantamount to request a hip pop dance band in the face of a funeral and expect people to jubilate. The problem does not require a hypotheses, it is as plain as the noses on our faces. During any analysis of a public sentiment toward the leadership, one should be able to differentiate between hatred and a simple dislike of the polity at work. It is easy to see that when people talk about OBJ they are in fact referring to the political status quo, his administration as a whole, and his tactics as a man in charge of that polity. At least I think the aggrieved inferences are about the tactics of the man and the people under him, and I beg to differ that there is nothing personal as you indicated. You have to understand that many of us even on this forum had at one time been part and parcel of that polity. However, you might be right that there are people that actually hate him having been Vis-à-vis with his political venom. It does not pay to distort facts; it is true that there are political propagandists from all sides. There are those that support him like you do regardless of his tactics. But it is not always good to be complicit with an erring administration that is selective in its prosecution. It is reasonably true that you have presented some assessment of OBJ administration but they were not balanced and objective as you indicated. Generally at the end you want people to accept your assessment as balanced and objective when in fact the opposite is true. It is not that people hate OBJ so much but because there is angst with the polity. No amount of praise singing can delude the people from the present reality which is all around them. Do you know that OBJ is still talking and boasting about his belated “Third Term?” Here is the link to the article http://odili.net/news/source/2007/may/20/399.html Statistical figures may show on paper that there is some economic improvement in Nigeria but what happens when it has no bearing on the common man? It becomes just manipulated figures to cover up administrative failures and to appease the international community until they come to see things for themselves. These realities are such that they can not be trivialized in any form. When there is any economic improvement in the country people will know it without being told. You do not need to tell the man that is walking in the rain that it’s raining. Why does it have to take three good years for him to get to the bottom of NEPA problem? How long did it take him to rig the election? Most Presidents make promises to accomplish things within the given four year term. If it takes him three years just to get to the bottom, what happened during the remaining five years of the eight year term? Is he still trying to float back to the top before his term expires in a few days? You see he can not deceive Nigerians with all these political rhetoric’s to safe guard his exit. Launching a satellite can not make Nigerians forget their misery. It reminded Nigerians that tons of their money that could have been used to create jobs has been given to an alien nation who already has a lot better than they have. It would not have mattered if we had at least a command center built and in operation for the Nigerian satellite. This will allow the many Nigerian scientists their dues in handling our own satellite information, management operation and protecting it. Now you must agree with me that this is not at all a dilemma in hypocrisy but fending for one’s nation against alien intrusion. I am not sure how OBJ will be remembered but I think launching a satellite while there is mass starvation, poor healthcare system, or if you will the decadence of our infrastructures will be one of them. Cheers brother. Posted by TEchi| 21.05.2007 21:52

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