By
Ifeanyi Afuba
How will the contest of Anambra State’s 2017
governorship process play out? The predictions are gradually coming and
expectedly, some are profound, some pedestrian. In this regard, one observes
that a highly, if not, absolute materialistic conception of Nigeria’s politics
is widely shared by ordinary citizens and politicians alike. But it is my
submission that this interpretation is stunted and misguided to the extent of
seeking to divinize man, mortalize God as well as ousting his jurisdiction in
the temporal affairs of man.
In the face of Governor Willie Obiano’s laudable
exploits in leadership, governance, the economy and infrastructure, many have
no problem tipping him to comprehensively win the forthcoming state
governorship election. Reservations have however been expressed in the context
of the APC – led federal government abusing the incumbency power in favour of
the APC in the said election. Sometime in November 2016, Mr Savior Emmanuel
addressed the following comment on Facebook to the Senior Special Assistant on
Media Matters to the Governor of Anambra State. ‘James Eze, tell your boss to
start getting ready his army of martyrs if he really means business sitting[continuing]
in Awka come 2017. I don’t see Ndi Anambra willing to make sacrifices of the
scale of Bayelsa and Rivers to keep the State…He [Obiano] must be ready to beat
INEC, Police, Army, DSS etc…He is not as dramatic as Fayose and Wike. He is
also far from being [ant]agonistic…He should take the way of … inciting the
people … and thereby raise a formidable civil resistance [against vote
rigging]. Tell Obiano to start agboro [thugs] training now before it is too
late.’
In one sense only the author of the above comments is
right. He is correct about the forces probably ranged against free and fair
elections but severely limited in the solution. Yes, even the blind can see the
stampede by Nigeria’s rice and stew politicians, mostly from the once ‘largest
party in Africa’, PDP to join Africa’s new bulldozing party, the APC. The exodus which erupted with the declaration
of APC’s victory in the 2015 presidential election has not abated with the party’s
serial repudiation and or devaluation of its campaign promises. By a wonder of
Nigeria’s somersaulting democracy, the scramble for APC membership by defecting
PDP politicians is gathering momentum even as the naira daily crashes in value;
the country’s electricity crisis worsens; the price of kerosene hits the
rooftop; Fulani herdsmen terrorism rages on; geo – political sections of the
south remain marginalized in appointments and budgetary allocations – all these
under the watch of an APC – led federal government. Yes, as illogical as it sounds, the appeal of
the APC for Nigerian politicians continues to mount right in the face of its
government’s failures and disregard of sensibilities of the population.
But it is not an experience peculiar to the APC. It is about the stomach factor in Nigeria’s
power game. The APC’s predecessor in government, the PDP also pulled off the
same spectacle of reverse result in its heydays. It led the country to a new
squandering of its riches, the wealth of the oil boom of the second
millennium. From electricity to roads;
housing to health; aviation to petroleum; from defence supplies to general
services, the country harvested sinkholes from dizzying allocations to many
sectors of the economy. Pump price of
petrol was increased arbitrarily a couple of times as if to test the will of
the people who had marched in protest at each imminent round of the so – called
removal of subsidy. And indeed, a PDP Presidency chose to test the resolve of
Nigerians with the antics of a life presidency clause. Yet, as this
misgovernance progressed, career politicians flocked to the PDP with flourish
and funfare. Bastions of opposition parties in the southwest and northwest soon
caved in to the tsunami of PDP imperialism.
Common sense tells us that this attachment to the
ruling party is founded on the perceived might of incumbency rather than on the
merits of what the party stands for. There is indeed an unregistered political movement
known as the association of any - government – in –power. And there is reason
to believe that these itinerant politicians are in search of refuge from the
dragnet of anti corruption bodies. To date, no notable APC politician, except
the odd one or two who defied the Presidency on the matter of legislative
leadership, is facing charges for corruption and those indicted by other organs
of State have been empowered with appointments.
But the truth and reality, which many tend to lose
sight of, is that the power of incumbency, even in typically repressive African
environment, may not confer the anticipated advantage to the ruling party in
elections. And this outcome does not have to depend on a ‘subversion’ of the
system by the opposing competitors. Neither the power of the ruling party nor
the militancy of the opposition is supreme or absolute. Power is situational,
but more importantly, human power is limited in time, space and scope. Supreme
power resides only with divine authority.
And it is unhelpful to deny the existence of God or to
argue that God has no role in political matters or to gloss over the divine
dimension in the study and appreciation of phenomena. At a time some would have
loved to hold tenaciously to advances in science and technology as creating the
self sufficiency of man and diminishing the concept of God, renowned
mathematician, Gabriel Oyibo, rattled such confidence with his acclaimed God
Almighty Grand Unified Theorem which establishes God as the source and summit
of knowledge – and by extension, power. There is a lesson too in the resort by
writers to the tool of deux ex machina for the resolution of complicated story
plots. A classical instance of divine supremacy in human affairs is seen in the
instantaneous rescue of the Israelites trapped between the Red Sea and the
Egyptian army.
History is replete with the heroic struggle of oppressed
people who overcame assault rifles and mechanised tanks with the inner strength
of moral conviction. Under the inspirational leadership of Saint John Paul 11,
the unarmed people of Poland dealt a mortal blow to communism in 1984 from
which chain effect the atheistic institution collapsed worldwide. At the hour
of engagement, the much vaunted apartheid war machine could not save the racist
system from dissolution by the superior logic of civilisation. When the people
of Philippines rose as one to call the bluff of Ferdinand Marcos’ veto of
presidential election result, the strength of people’s solidarity forced him to
flee. Armed only with prayers, Nigerians secured their freedom as divine
authority stopped a rampaging Sani Abacha in his tracks. Against the wishes and
plots of the ruling establishment, Peter Obi’s 2003 stolen mandate was
retrieved without resort to a single act of violence. Let it be emphasized that
the hand of divine intervention which has brought Anambra to its present point
of promise and renewal is still very much at work in the State.
Beyond the over – zealous and unhealthy calls for
militarization of the Anambra 2017 governorship process; we recognise that
intimidation is part of the tactics for seeking to gain political advantage. It
is in the interest of those who know that Obiano’s phenomenal achievements will
dwarf them in the eyes of the Anambra electorate to play up the propaganda of
might is right. It is a scare campaign that has to contend with the
counterpoise of Nigeria’s role in enforcement of the electoral defeat of
Gambia’s Yahaya Jammeh. Anambra has come a long way from the siege of fascists.
Its non – violent revolution is set to win again because only God has the last
say in the affairs of men.
