Moment Of Reality …Buhari, APC, National Problems

Buhari and Saraki

It is amusing to hear apologists of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in defence of the Federal government say there are indeed no quick fixes to addressing the gruelling national challenges, for which they got the people’s mandate in the last general elections. Even the National Leader of the party Bola Ahmed Tinubu echoed same sentiments. But that was not what they told Nigerians during the campaigns.
All through the campaigns leading to the elections, the APC presented itself as a party with answers to all national questions and challenges. They promised change in the areas of national security, near comatose economy, poor electricity power supply, unstable petroleum products distribution, lack of a welfare package for unemployed graduates, shaky infrastructural development, absence of diversification of the economy with needed preference for agriculture and industtrialisation and less than competitive value of the Naira.
The argument then was that the party’s flag-bearer, General Muhammadu Buhari being an anti-corruption apostle, a retired general, and former Head of State and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, was very experienced, prepared and ready to hit the ground running, once elected, as against the pedigree of former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, whom they described as relatively inexperienced.
To convince Nigerians, the APC propaganda machine repeatedly said it had produced a blue-print of action, which would usher the required positive change Nigerians eagerly yearned for. They brandished a very lofty manifesto which they said would turn-around the economy, in no time, create millions of jobs, improve the power situation, ensure regular supply of Petroleum products, especially petrol and kerosene and most importantly, ensure the security of lives and property.
Nearly one year after, most of the problems have degenerated from bad to worse, with no inkling that the administration is on top of the game. The first sign that the Federal Government was not prepared for the mandate it got was during the constitution of the leadership of the National Assembly.
As it turned out, Senate President, Bukola Saraki was not the party’s preferred candidate for Chairmanship of the National Assembly, in the same vein, Yakubu Dogara, Speaker of the House of Representatives was said to have usurped a position which the party reserved for someone else.
That created political crisis, with the party hierarchy battling from outside the Legislature to unseat the unwanted elements. Infact, Senate President Saraki’s travails before the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT)  are believed to be remotely, or even directly tied to what party leader’s consider as punishment for his coup detat. To date, there seems to be mutual suspicion between the National Assembly and the Federal Executive Council on the one hand, and the National Assembly with APC leadership on the other.
This suspicion manifested itself in the Assembly’s handling of the Budget sent to it by President Buhari, with alarms and blames of budget padding, loss of the original copy of the fiscal document and eventual tampering with provisions made therein. In fact, Buhari’s insistence on studying details of the budget first before signing it into law, after the NASS passage are all signs of the lack of trust between both arms.
With this measure of distrust, there does not seem to be the required synergy to hit the ground running. Even the mercurial Lai Mohammed, erstwhile APC propaganda machine, now Information Minister seems dried of the right words to explain the state of affairs.
Let’s not forget, it took the administration more than five months to constitute a federal cabinet of thoroughly recycled brains.
For months now, after repeated promises of change by the Petroleum Resources Ministry, which the President himself heads, fuel remains so scarce, when found, it sells for between N2,000 and N3,000 for a 10 litre jerrycan in the black market, the only alternative to the dry filling stations, instead of N870.
Nigeria which is one of the world’s top seven producers of crude still cannot provide enough petrol for local consumption, in spite of the change the APC promised before the elections.
The last deadline after several, given by the Petroleum Ministry’s Junior Minister, Dr Ibe Kachikwu was that by last weekend the product would be in abundance in Lagos and Abuja, and two days later, nationwide. But Abuja and Lagos residents said it was same old story. And Nigerian refineries still remain unuseful.
What of electricity power supply? From about 4,000MW it has dropped to below 2,500 causing bigger untold hardship on the citizenry. With scarcity of foreign currency support to buy generating sets, the people are simply in one big heat-hole, gasping for the last breath. Yet the FG has no answer to the tricks of the DISCOS.
With all these on, and the 2016 budget yet to work, speedy infrastructure development remains a mirage. Infact, the second Niger Bridge initially projected to be completed and delivered next year is now merely a pipe dream. So is the East West Road.
The economy is in a very bad shape with no positive signal that people are thinking. It’s been all complaints. Nearly a year into the tenure of an elected government, what Nigerians get daily are complaints against and blames on the past government which lapses it promised to correct, having researched and found solutions to all the problems.
So bad, some of the promises made are also being denied. A welfare package promised unemployed graduates for which the hopeful Nigerian youth lined up behind the APC in the last election has been blown-up by the wind. Infact, some even said the promise was not made to jobless graduates but to the very poor and vulnerable in the society.
Who is more vulnerable? A jobless oldman who could depend on alms from even neighbours or a jobless graduate, who so frustrated could, allow self to be conscripted into a gang of criminals or even Boko Haram? But they say jobless graduates are not the most vulnerable.
This leads us to the worrisome level of insecurity in the land.
There are likely to have been  more deaths in the past two months across the country than last two years of the former administration, excepting Boko Haram related killings by soldiers. Daily, there are stories of senseless killings arising from clashes between herdsmen and defenceless farmers and communities, kidnappings and indeed cult-related violence.
The basic responsibility of any government is the protection of lives and property of its citizens. If that basic responsibility also does not have a quick-fix then the people live without hope.
Yet, in its desperation to expand its political power base, the APC government has also been putting at risk, the Nigerian Army’s reputation and relation with the Nigerian people. Rather than being the friends of the citizenry some Nigerians now perceive soldiers as potential political enemies, because of their misuse in civil issues.
Only recently, an Army Colonel abducted days earlier in Kaduna was found dead. And last week, dead bodies were found in a pit at the outskirts of Rivers State, with locals not recognising any. Many suggested, they could be products of extra-judicial killing.
Also, it is safe to say that the APC-led federal government seems to lack the neutrality required to institute a dependable, free and fair national electoral body that would conduct conclusive elections. Look at experiences of Kogi, Bayelsa and Rivers states. It appears that when the outcome of an election is unfavourable to the ruling party and government of the day, it is declared inconclusive; otherwise, what is holding the collated and announced results of the Rivers rerun?
This is why many Nigerians have started expressing doubts that the favourable democratic platform which ushered in the APC may be sustained. Some say it has since been destroyed and the ruling party now hopes on ‘Federal Might’ and the same impunity it often accused the PDP of, as sure-bet to win subsequent elections.
An octogenarian, Pa Wilcox Papaye, recently lamented in an interview with newsmen in Port Harcourt, “Is it what you call change? Is it change for better or worse? This is worso-o”. It is the same refrain running through the lips of many.
But by far the most annoying is the unfulfilled promises to rescue the Chibok girls, for which a coalition of civil society groups lined up behind the APC. Nearly two years after, the government still has no clue, although Nigerian troops have done quite well in the battle against Boko Haram, with  daily capture of terror kingpins.
What is needed now is for the Buhari-led government, to identify at least one problem, solve it fully and use it as a branding effort to market other yet-to-be fulfilled promises. More importantly, they should realise that posterity will not forgive the government of the day, if out of desperation, it kills the same nascent democracy that allowed it into power.
My Agony is that many of those who should be worried are still in a fool’s paradise, illusion of grandeaur, as if all is well. But they do not hear the talk on the streets. That may be why they seem comfortable.
Nigerians NEED real change for the better not the horrors of today.

Soye Wilson Jamabo