19 years ago, an election was held in Nigeria in which a Yoruba muslim
by the name of Moshood Abiola, won the majority of votes in both the north and
south of the country. Stunned at the unexpected development, the then junta
decided to annul the elections, plunging the country into a crisis from which
it is yet to fully emerge.
The winner of that election was arrested and tossed into a dungeon to
await the pleasure of Khalifa. His wife, who carried on the fight for him on
the outside, was brutally murdered for having the gall to demand that her
husband’s victory be recognized and his mandate restored.
Khalifa, then began his own transition program, with the aim of
emerging from the cocoon of military dictatorship as a beautiful, dark-goggled
civilian butterfly. The plan was going smoothly, the people had to endure being
told that Khalifa was the key to their future, and the only man “the cap fit”.
And then, one day, right out of the blue, Khalifa died. To this day,
speculation surrounds his death, ranging from a poisoned apple wielded by a
nubile assassin of Asian origin, to his heart giving out because he ignored the
warnings on Viagra packets about mixing the erectile dysfunction medication
with alcohol.
Either way, Khalifa passed on, and we held our breath to see if now,
finally, Abiola would be granted his mandate. Alas, it was not to be. In the
midst of discussions with the new junta, Abiola slumped and passed on,
conveniently solving a rather knotty problem, but that is a discussion for another day.
The new junta quickly organized elections, and on May 29, 1999, a
civilian President was sworn in. Calls began for MKO to be recognized as a hero
of the struggle for democracy, and immortalised as such. These calls were
largely ignored by the new rulers who, it quickly emerged, had by and large
come from the ranks of the sycophants, apologists, and collaborators who had
done their level best to prevent the return of democracy to the country. It was
also quickly established that these new rulers had little patience for the rule
of the ballot, preferring rigging and outright brutality as their route to
attaining and retaining power. For these people, Abiola remains a reminder of
what they could never hope to achieve: power through legitimate, free and fair
elections.
In 2011, Nigerians trooped to the polls to elect Goodluck Ebele
Jonathan as their President. It is safe to say that his administration has been
an unmitigated disaster, and we still have 3 years to go. The GEJ
administration has lurched from one crisis to another, with flagrant corruption
and stupefying incompetence as its hallmarks.
Surprisingly, on May 29, 2012, 19 years after the election he won was
annulled, GEJ decided to do something for Abiola, announcing that the
University of Lagos would be renamed the Moshood Abiola University. Cue bedlam.
Students took to the streets to protest the renaming of “their”
university with poorly-spelled placards. Twitter erupted, some people taking to
their handles to question whether there weren’t more important things to deal
with than the names of universities. Some simply poured scorn on the man. Others
pontificated on the value of the name of the university, saying that it had to
do with its heritage. In short, there were so many soapboxes “clumb” upon, it
is a wonder that there was any space left for listeners. It is a measure of
just how unpopular this administration is that a move meant to recognize a hero
of the country swiftly became another stick to beat the President with.
One particular accusation that has been leveled at Mr. President is
that this decision was taken to distract Nigerians from the epic failure his
administration has been thus far. And I must wonder, have we, as a people, not yet reached that stage in our development in
which we can say to Mr. President, “We are glad that you have finally decided
to recognize the contribution of Abiola to your being in office today, and we
say thank you. Now, how about implementing the recommendations of the subsidy
probe report, and firing your hopelessly inept Minister of Petroleum? And oh,
while you’re at it, where in nine hells are the allowances for our Youth Corps
members?”
Are we not capable of engaging multiple issues in this manner? The
furore over the name change of UNILAG ignores one fundamental factor, which is
that UNILAG is owned, operated, and funded by the Federal Government of
Nigeria, which can consequently call “UNILAG” whatever the hell it wants. As
such, those saying that similar protests would occur if the US Government
decided to rename Harvard University completely miss the point as Harvard isn’t
owned by the US government. Others say that GEJ does not have the power to change the name of a University by executive fiat, but nothing stops Mr. President from submitting a bill to the National Assembly seeking to amend the University of Lagos Act accordingly. (Where it may well wallow for another 20 years.)
We have complained for over a decade that our “democratic”
Federal Government had signally failed to recognize Abiola's contributions to democracy. We argued that June
12, not May 29, should be recognized as Democracy Day. We said recognizing Abiola
had to go far beyond naming one road after him in Abuja.
At long last, the man receives official recognition and this is how people
react? I am willing to wager that many of the students protesting have no idea
who Abiola was, or know that Lagos was the epicenter of the protests for the
man’s mandate to be restored. I wish the ghosts of those UNILAG students who
were killed for daring to protest the annulment of the freest and fairest
election in our history, could rise up and give these kids a history lesson
they would never forget.
Indeed, if the objective of renaming UNILAG after Abiola was to
distract people from the fact that one year into his first full tenure, GEJ is
yet to give Nigerians any reason to smile about their choice at the polls, and
instead has foisted increasing hardship, unprecedented levels of corruption, and Keystone Kops-esque ineptitude
on the country, then I must congratulate GEJ for finally achieving something he set
out to do. People are so busy preparing arguments and counter-arguments over
what should have been brushed aside with a “that’s nice”, that they have lost
sight of the fact that once again, our President has given us a speech with
zero substance to it. He did not unveil anything in that speech that we can say
was aimed at checking the rot in the security situation. He didn’t say anything
about the corruption that has risen to eye-popping levels under his care. He hasn’t told
us how he intends to tackle the members of his party who are sponsoring
terrorists, a situation that prompted his NSA to speak out in frustration. Hell,
the man even refused to say “Amen” to a prayer against corruption and corrupt
politicians a couple of days prior to this speech, and in our uber-religious
society, that should have raised all sorts of red flags.
Instead, we have once again demonstrated our unmatched capacity for supremely
energetic shadow chasing. GEJ and his advisors must be thrilled.
I say to GEJ, “Thank you Mr. President, for recognizing a hero of
democracy. Now, how about doing something substantial for once in your
administration, like implementing the recommendations of the subsidy probe
report, doing something about the Boko Haram sponsors in your party, or are you
only capable of bending your knees to terrorists and telling us to endure their actions?”
