By Abubakar Sulaiman Muhd
Buhari came in during a tough time -
a situation that looks “like building Rome in one day without a
Kobo.” He is in position not many would love to be in their life, not
even his sons and daughters if they are like the children of other greed
politicians who enjoy living from the suffering of downtrodden.
The expectations are high despite the
dwindling of oil price, armed struggle, massive theft of foreign reserve and
mounting national debt. But such expectations could not be compromised because
the masses whom Buhari climbed their shoulders to the post “have no water, no
food, no road, no good education, no security, no light, no fuel and no
nothing.” Said Pius Adesanmi, a key backer and campaigner at the intellectual
core of Buharism. They are people left with only hope and trust in Buhari
regime.
He is expected to deliver those
expectations. People believe in his integrity. He has had certain principles
that prevent him, in his mind, from becoming like every other politicians.
Numerous efforts had been made to drag him into the gutter to abandon his cause
in exchange for lucrative offer. His dogma to remain with masses earned him the
honorific epithet of “Mai Gaskiya” – the Hausa version of ‘trusted’ which
distinguished him as the beacon of hope and champion of the underdogs.
He stood for the office for 12 years,
fighting for the masses every election season since 2003. Frustrated, he
publically shed tears in 2011 after election defeat to announce his intention
to not vie for the office of the president anymore. After rigorous persuasion
and lobbying, he reluctantly answered the call to contest again, which
certainly if defeated yet again, would mark the end of his political career.
Buhari is not poor, he’s only a rich man
with relative ascetism. For what, and to whom is he doing all this?
Buhari sees Nigeria as a family firm, an afflicting business he could not
watch continue suffer and felt duty-bound to rescue. He delved into the
struggle for the young generation to wrench back hopes and save the nation’s
throat from the vicious grip of the greedy leaders so that upon growing up the
young men and women would not find their future entirely destroyed or mortgaged
to the IMF. “Don’t collect any loan again,” the citizens cried, “it isn’t
working here. It will only push us deeper and deeper into economic despair.
In Nigeria, the finance ministers and
former and serving Central Bank Governors are people who read Economics mainly
for private values, accepting exploitative conditionalities and doing all it
takes to keep the economy going in line with the IMF directives. “I wish Buhari
economic team would comprise of people who have idea about the terrible
condition of our people,” working to benefit all and not entirely for the
advancement of IMF policies which create anger and hardship on people who are
already poor and rewarding those with awards as hero who help ensure the
execution of the deals while our people are dying.
There is one critical issue that needs to
be addressed. Early in 2012 Nigerians took to the streets rioting in protest
against government decision to end fuel subsidy. They insisted the price should
remain cheap at the pump whether the subsidy existed or not. People are caught
in dilemma, knowing the fuel subsidy is fraud, a business rife with tax
evasion, patronage and corruption, which raised public suspicion if the subsidy
has actually existed. It was elite fraud where friends of politicians are paid
inflated figure for bringing little or nothing at all to report the kickback to
the people high in government. But believing they, and not the
politicians, not the power structure, would be the biggest victims if the
subsidy was to be eliminated, they fought for the subsidy to continue despite
the fact they needed a competitive economy.
But the notion that subsidy could not
be good idea in creating healthy and competitive economy is nonsense from the
ordinary citizens’ perspective who
couldn’t even have to listen to the economist’s bullshits that ignores the
worsening state of people’s atrocious living condition.
“Then what’s the use of the state,” people
asked, “henceforth, if healthcare, fuel, education, water and energy would not
be provided at subsidized price. Then the government ceases to be useful
to ordinary citizens because these are the only ways the poor can benefits from
the wealth of the motherland?”
We criticized Jonathan for his decision to
end fuel subsidy, vociferous and outspoken, speaking scathingly anyhow in TV
and public debates because we were not politicians and the politicians were in
opposition, employing angry pens to write and draw repugnant caricature of the
president and his cabinet, depicting a dog wearing a bowler hat for the
president and a bitch with glass in her face describing the coordinating minister
of economy.
And now there is a big question hanging
perilously on the air: what if Buhari administration seeks to end subsidy
on petroleum resources - isn’t it hypocritical of us to defend the same policy
we vehemently attacked as if we were fighting for our life?
Buhari does not believe fuel subsidy has
even existed. If he is going to cancel the subsidy on petroleum resources in
order to stop leakages to make the economy more vibrant, radical overhaul
should be put in place to cleanse the sector of its corrupt practices. National
refineries should be revived so that citizens can buy fuel at a cheap price for
there is no way one will consume fuel from foreign refineries and expect the
price to be low without government doling out subsidy.
What Jonathan administration would never
do was starting the austerity measures from descending and not ascending order,
a selfish move to oppress the poor by eliminating jobs and raising heavy tax on
the ordinary citizens, slashing pensions and wages while the terrible reality
revealing itself as severe hardship on the masses. It should start in
descending order from the top leadership in order to avoid humanitarian crisis;
cut the sinful executive allowances, cut corruption and the leakage in the
economy, weed out the parasites in government to make an effective and sizable
workforce so that with every cut, you help the state and those morons in office
who blabbed their way through the universities as students so as to be
optimally utilized on farmland since they find productivity a rocket science.
Jonathan and his cabinets were not the
sort of men that Nigerians would trust since they could not exercise little
restraint before descending upon the fuel subsidy trust fund. What they were
selling to the masses was stark inhumanity - starving the poor, feeding the
rich and having strong armed forces to keep down civil unrest. Under whatever
regime, Nigerians can’t accept a deal where the coordinating minister of the
economy would loot and then lied to Nigerians, loading it on the masses,
emptying the foreign reserve to lead a life of luxury and buying big mansions
in Zurich. All this as austerity measure?
Nigerians are ready to bear the brunt of
cuts in government spending, with top officials setting examples. As the
president identified the horrible condition in his speech, quoting from Julius
Caesar, “the tide in the affairs of men is difficult” but not insurmountable
that “we could not succumb to hopelessness and defeatism. We can fix our
problems.”
The new regime will concentrate its focus
on the project of building new Nigeria. Only that we will continue working to
document thieving politicians so that when their children grew up, they would
read that their parents are thieves and dullards who only perfected the art of
stealing and looting so that they would wish if they were born in another
family. Those who’d run should run, the new regime is not going to chase after
you. The past is the prologue.
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