Posted by: Mr. Mikail Mumuni Posted on: Mon, 15 Dec 2014 07:22:32 +0000 tribune.ng/columns/insid ... n-must-win Buhari must win! Jonathan must win! By Lasisi Olagunju If you are a registered voter in Nigeria, there are three choices before you as you approach February 14, 2015 presidential election. You can vote for Change, for Continuity or for Nothing. You vote for Change if you vote Muhammadu Buhari; Continuity if Goodluck Jonathan gets your vote. You vote for nothing if you decide to thumbprint any other symbol apart from the ones representing these two or you stay at home watching television. Whichever choice you make, the consequences are very grave and gravely scary. Each of the options has the potential of making you either an Internally Displaced Person (IDP) or a refugee in Benin Republic or in Cameroon, if you are lucky. There is no gentleman between the two ‘gentlemen’ flying the flags of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC). Ijaw man, Goodluck Jonathan’s mindset is that he must win the coming contest whatever it takes. That must explain why his party ensured, for the first time since it was founded in 1998, that only one person came forward to contest its presidential ticket. Others who dared dream of coming out are, this moment, still cowering, shivering under the seedy beds of their concubines. Across the street, Fulani irredentist, Muhammadu Buhari, too must win, that is why he is in the race. From Sokoto, through Kaduna, to Borno, God help he who stands on the way of the gangling soldier-statesman. The song on the lips in these places sounds like the one rendered by soldiers of Uthman Dan Fodio as they filed out to dip their swords in the sea. And, even down south, in the South West especially, a strange Buhari cult is out on the street with a vow that it must be this man or nothing on February 14, 2015. He cannot lose, they stress and warn without telling us why he must be the one deserving of the crown. Between Jonathan and Buhari, we are being told to choose. And I ask: is their a choice between them? I learnt very early enough to detect and turn down rancid oranges whenever offered. But supporters of these two tell us they would accept nothing but victory for their man from the Nigerian electorate. No gentleman goes into a contest with the sole goal of winning at all costs. When two contenders for a throne won’t take nothing but the stool, they will certainly shred the crown and, as the palace goes to ruins, the town too risks getting burnt down. There are many local examples I dare not cite here, because in a game of thrones, it is not enough to know the truth. In seeking to tell the truth, which is always terrible, you must “invent a story...” After Muhammadu Buhari got his party’s ticket last Thursday, I looked at his face. His look was very distant. He wasn’t like all others around him thinking of the victory and the loss of the moment. He was already over there, post-February 14. “If what happened in 2011 (alleged rigging) should happen again in 2015, by the grace of God, the dog and the baboon will both be soaked in blood,” he warned as far back as May 2012 about the coming polls. The Fulani man gave a three-year notice. So, now that he has the ticket, let him see that man born of a woman who would face this his last battle. Looking that distant among the APC pack that Thursday in Lagos, he must be chanting his Fulani war song. And who is the dog and who is the baboon between him and Jonathan? It will appear the dog and the baboon have long been out smelling blood and salivating. One of Jonathan’s main men, Mujahid Dokubo - Asari, on a Channels Television programme in September 2013, issued his side’s own warning to all voters in Nigeria to elect his kinsman or risk war: “2015 is already a settled matter; Goodluck Jonathan will be president in 2015. Whether they contest or they don’t contest, Goodluck Jonathan will be president...If they say the blood of the dog and the baboon will be soaked in water on the street; in blood on the street; in salt water on the street, we will help them soak them in blood...” The signs are very clear now. When a street boy uses his finger to violate his own sister, the neighbour’s daughter better close her legs and take to her heels. Even governors in the Niger Delta are reportedly daily harassed with threats of war by militants who are empowered and emboldened by their kinsman’s enormous powers. Some bigmen in that zone are dropping their ambitions like scotching embers in the face of threats of war from a people who have become husbands of the land. And up north, the frowns are very visible on all faces. I called a colleague some days ago and asked him why the north hates Jonathan so much. “It is not hatred. We do not want him because we don’t feel secure under him,” he told me. Self preservation is the first law of man. That sentiment spreads across that vast region which today reeks of large swaths of refugee camps - courtesy of deliberate, official indecisiveness or pure incompetence or both. Nonetheless, will having either of these two stiff candidates with unbending constituencies worth the costs in trouble? I sincerely do not think so but I am afraid it may be too late for Nigeria. Or maybe I am just being plainly paranoid about the whole thing. Maybe the whole fears are just misplaced. Maybe it is all again about the characteristic Nigeria dancing on the brink. Maybe there will be no fall off the cliff. Maybe...but I strongly feel the die is cast. Mikail Adegoke Mumuni Editor, Nations Capital Newswatch Times
Posted on: Mon, 15 Dec 2014 11:53:30 +0000
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