FOR THE RECORD Buhari: A Leopard Does Not Change Its Colour Wole Soyinka The grounds on which General Buhari is being promoted as the alternative choice are not only shaky, but pitifully naive. History matters. Records are not kept simply to assist the weakness of memory, but to operate as guides to the future. Of course, we know that human beings change. What the claims of personality change or transformation impose on us is a rigorous inspection of the evidence, not wishful speculation or behind-the- scenes assurances. In Buhari, we have been offered no evidence of the sheerest prospect of change. On the contrary, all evidence suggests that this is one individual who remains convinced that he is one ex-ruler that the nation cannot call to order. Buhari enslaved the nation. He gloated and gloried in a master-slave relation to the millions of its inhabitants. It is astonishing to find that the same former slaves, now free of their chains, should clamour to be ruled by one who not only turned their nation into a slave plantation, but forbade them any discussion of their condition. Nor must we omit the manner of Buhari coming to power and the pattern of his corrective rule. Responsibility for the national condition lay squarely at the door of the ruling party, obviously, but against whom was Buhari’s coup staged? Judging by the conduct of that regime, it was not against Shagari’s government but against the opposition. The head of government, on whom primary responsibility lay, was Shehu Shagari. Yet that individual was kept in cosy house detention in Ikoyi while his powerless deputy, Alex Ekwueme, was locked up in Kirikiri prisons. Such was the Buhari notion of equitable apportionment of guilt and/or responsibility. Recall, if you please, the judicial processes undergone by the septuagenarian Chief Adekunle Ajasin. He was arraigned and tried before Buhari’s punitive tribunal but acquitted. Dissatisfied, Buhari ordered his re-trial. Again, the tribunal could not find this man guilty of a single crime, so once again he was returned for trial, only to be acquitted of all charges of corruption or abuse of office. Was Chief Ajasin thereby released? No! He was ordered detained indefinitely, simply for the crime of winning an election and refusing to knuckle under Shagari’s reign of terror. One is only too aware that some Nigerians love to point to Buhari’s agenda of discipline as the shining jewel in his scrap-iron crown. To inculcate discipline however, one must lead by example. For the exercise of a changeover of the national currency, the Nigerian borders air, sea and land had been shut tight. The story of the thirty something suitcases it would appear that they were even closer to 50 – found unavoidable mention in my recent memoirs, YOU MUST SET FORTH AT DOWN. For the exercise of a changeover of the national currency, the Nigerian borders air, sea and land had been shut tight. Nothing was supposed to move in or out, not even cattle egrets. Yet a prominent camel was allowed through that needles eye. Not only did Buhari dispatch his aide-de-camp, Mustapha Jokolo, later to become an emir- to facilitate the entry of those cases, he ordered the redeployment as I later discovered – of the Customs Officer who stood firmly against the entry of the contravening baggage. What does one choose to include or leave out? What precisely was Ebenezer Babatope’s crime that he should have spent the entire tenure of General Buhari in detention? Nothing beyond the fact that he once warned in the media that Buhari was an ambitious soldier who would bear watching through the lenses of a coup-detat. Babatope’s father died while he was in Buhari’s custody, the dictator remained deaf to every plea that he be at least released to attend his father’s funeral, even under guard. •Professor Wole Soyinka wrote this in 2011. It is reproduced here for its contemporary relevance.
Posted on: Sat, 03 Jan 2015 05:26:25 +0000