28 Apr 2009 |
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THE UNMAKING OF ATIKU Ebo Chigbo Socrates Politics indeed is a chase game. A player is condemned to a rude shock if he takes his opponent on the face value. It is a game which calls for the highest application of the deepest faculties of the human intellect. It is an ancient game. But unlike chase, it is not played for fun. No. It is an inverted the war. The rules of engagement are the same. They are immutable and immortal. Ignore them at your peril, master them for your perpetual felicity. Do not outshine the master. If you must become a master, never fail to decapitate the master. Power is never given but taken. Despise the free gift; in politics nothing is free. Absolute evil deserves absolute punishment. Victory is a postponed combat. In defeat keep your head high. There is no return beyond the Rubicon. Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, immediate past vice-president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, no doubt is an astute politician. He paid his dues. He did his tutelage under the legendry retired General Shehu Yaradua, famous for his wizardry in political strategy. Atiku strategized himself into reckoning during the hay days of the Social Democratic Party. At the dawn of the Fifth Republic, Atiku made the elongated leap from governorship to vice-presidency. At the demise of General Shehu Yaradua, Atiku inherited his political structure, the People’s Democratic Movement, which later became an integral part of the People’s Democratic Party. General Obasanjo who devoid of any political structure, was drafted to the presidency from the bleak walls of prison, literally fell for Atiku who inherited the formidable political structure of Obasanjo’s friend and benefactor, General Yaradua. Hence, Atiku’s vertical lift from governorship to presidency. Obasanjo must have reasoned he owed Yaradua a good turn, a desecration of the law of power. While General Obasanjo so excited at being ‘dashed’ the presidency, and so desirous of seeing the world which he missed so much during the dark gloomy days at Sani Abacha’s gulag, literally started flying like a butterfly from one capital to another. During, the first tenure of his presidency, Obasanjo was so eager to see the world that he merely spent his spare time at Aso Rock. Meanwhile, Atiku was lapping up the opportunity, as Obasanjo, surrendered governance to him. Atiku built alliances across ethnic the divides in the country. When Obasanjo, sought a second term of the presidency, he was jolted by the rude realization that the joker lay, not in his hands but in the hands of his deputy! Being an accomplished man of power, Obasanjo literally stooped to conquer. Obasanjo knelt down before Atiku to beg for a second term of the presidency. Atiku, swayed by the euphoria of the moment, graciously surrendered the presidency he already had firmly in his grasps to Obasanjo. What a breach of the law of power! Which man can successfully resist flattery? That was the denouement of Atiku’s political career. To put it baldly Atiku committed hara-kiri. When in 2006, it became clearly manifest that Obasanjo wanted to die a president, Nigerians were alarmingly jolted. All men of power who understood that the third term plot would mean their political obituary rose against it. The Nigerian Bar Association as well as a coalition of civil rights societies rose against the plot. The battle line was clearly drawn. The then chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Mr. Nuhu Ribadu was at his mischievous best, whipping into line, with the awesome apparatus of the EFCC, all those who dared object to the infernal plot. Atiku Abubakar distinguished himself before the generality of Nigerians by leading the anti-third term movement. He gave Obasanjo the fight of his life. It was an epic political battle. Obasanjo’s vindictiveness is legendary. Partly to Atiku’s credit, the third term project crashed like a badly arranged cards. The crashing of the third term plot dazed Obasanjo beyond his cornea into his retina. Till date, Obasanjo is yet to recover from that politically mortal shock. Expectedly, a rattled Obasanjo came viciously after Atiku for his pound of flesh. The whole apparatchiks of the Obasanjo administration were unleashed on Atiku, with Nuhu Ribadu and the rabid El Rufai gleefully leading the pack. They came after Atiku with the ferocity of Alsatian dogs. They used every instrument of political warfare on Atiku Abubakar. They blackmailed the man into abundant pity and rare sympathy of the generality of Nigerians. Many Nigerians came to see Atiku as an underdog who is receiving a raw deal from the hands an overbearing boss. Of course, the enemy of your enemy is your friend; a veritable law of power. Many Nigerians, including this writer came to identify with Atiku, if not for anything but to spite Obasanjo; a man they happily hold in contempt. Atiku, no doubt won the goodwill of the generality of Nigerians. For Obasanjo’s enemies were a legion, Nigerians sought for a veritable means of showing their defiance to Obasanjo. If truth had meaning in Nigeria, Atiku was well nigh the presidency in 2007. Though the PDP and the 4-3 court chose to rewrite the history, Nigerians know very much in their hearts whom they voted for. They have not forgotten at all. Despite the verdict of the 4-3 court, they are seething. They are itching to do something. They had come to see Atiku as a leader they could trust in their quest to entrench true democracy in the country. Alas! How shocked Nigerians were when Atiku suddenly visited Obasanjo at Ota. To add insult, no: raw salt to fresh and bleeding injury, Atiku waxed a lengthy sermon on forgiveness and blahblah, to the supreme annoyance of the already properly vexed Nigerians! As if that were not enough, Atiku turned his back on the millions of Nigerians who stuck out their necks for him and started making moves to return to the PDP, ostensibly to be dashed the presidency! Who told Atiku that power is given? No. Never! It is taken. Atiku clearly, wanted a shortcut to power. Unfortunately, shortcuts exist only to failure. How Atiku failed to calculate accurately, the antics of the PDP befuddles the mind. Desire indeed, beclouds reason. Atiku ended up rendering himself an un-different Nigerian politician! What self-disservice! On his own and solely by himself, Atiku has firmly disqualified himself from the trust of Nigerians. Requiem. O politician, master the laws of power to your perpetual felicity or ignore them at your own peril. Atiku broke the laws. Do not outshine your master: Atiku clearly outshone his master, in the first term of their rule. Obasanjo had to stoop to conquer. He had to kneel down before Atiku in 2003 to correct that mistake. Atiku should have been wise enough to keep his desire for the presidency low keyed. Alex Ekwueme was a perfect student of this law. Though he wanted to succeed Shagari, he played the gentleman vice-president. Despite his intimidating credentials, he was so level headed that Umar Dikko, the transport minister became the defacto vice-president. Ekwueme was not bothered, his interest was clearly the presidency. But for the military intervention, which took place precisely to stop Ekwueme (a la Mustapha Jokolo’s jarred lips ), Ekwueme would have surely succeeded Shagari. If you must become a master, never fail to decapitate the master. Why did Atiku discourage the first move to impeach Obasanjo. It was his best and earliest opportunity to grab power. Why did Atiku fail to take the PDP ticket given him on a platter a la PDP governors? That was an inexcusable breach of the ancient law. Power is never given but taken. Why did Atiku fail to take that ticket and keep it? Despise the free gift, what on earth made Atiku believe that the PDP would dash him the presidency all the way from the AC? Who goaded him on? In politics, nothing is free. Even when Obasanjo pretended to dash the humble Umar Yaradua the presidency, the shrewd man was not ignorant of the dynamics at play. He knew in the silence of his heart that not Obasanjo but the anti-third term movement gave him the presidency. He wisely affected nonchalance while the Ota farmer was busy fooling himself. Yaradua has since demonstrated that he is nobody’s fool. Unknown to many Nigerians, Yaradua is an adept student of power. He feigned dead to wrest the presidency from Obasanjo. When the pilfered mandate became more of a pillory, he fooled Nigerians by feigning indifference to power! He promised electoral reforms as if he did not know that the PDP’s veritable tool of winning is rigging. The reforms are already on their way to the dustbin! When his campaign for 2011, got on the nerves of Nigerians, he ostensibly, warned party men to desist from mentioning 2011! Check out 2011. The shrewd Umar is not in a hurry to the grave. He will kick through 2011-15 and go ahead to make his own attempt at a third term! Absolute evil begets absolute punishment, how come Atiku came to the thought that the PDP he deployed every weapon in his political arsenal to destroy not long ago would suddenly, forget, forgive and dash him presidency. Ah, no be so! Has he forgotten that the Jibril Aminu’s are still there? No, sermons don’t work here. Victory is a postponed combat. What Atiku ought to have done was to be in effective opposition and motivate Nigerians to rise against the PDP. The bad governance of the PDP affects their wives, their children, their friends, enemies and even their members more than non members. Who says the police and the armed forces are not interested in good governance? The truth of the matter is that the real PDP are not up to a thousand people. Check out: a thousand people holding over 140 million people to ransom! The day Nigerians realise this will mark the obituary of the ‘largest party in Africa’. Atiku shirked this responsibility; he vacillated at best. There is no return beyond the Rubicon. Atiku is AC for life, first by choice; now by force. That is his lot. His attempting to leave the AC is akin to Peter attempting to deny Jesus Christ. Atiku smells of AC. Perhaps it was this odour that made the PDP uncomfortable at the roundtable with Atiku over his possible return! Atiku has finally and wisely come back to AC. But the holy mass is ended already. Even in this, the Rubicon has been crossed too! The AC, must go shopping. Yes, the AC must go shopping for what you already know. It is requiem.
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