Yesterday, Monday, May 29, 2023, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu took the oath of office and became the 5th President and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in this dispensation!
By assuming the Oath of Allegiance and Oath of Office, he became the numero uno, the Chief of State, the Chief Security Officer of the whole nation, and the Commander in Chief of the nation’s Armed Forces.
From yesterday, every Nigerian has a new President. That is the ethic and practice of democracy. Whether you voted for him or not, Tinubu is Nigeria’s president until further notice. Unless the courts rule otherwise, he is Nigeria’s President for the 2023 to 2027 term. However, such a court ruling is highly unlikely given the precedents set by the Supreme Court in all the previous years of presidential election adjudications!
Those who are saying otherwise do not know their civics. I repeat, once sworn in as President, Tinubu has been sworn in, he is the President of every Nigerian!
To say otherwise or act otherwise is undemocratic and untenable in a constitutional democracy. Whether we agree with how he got there or not, we cannot pick and choose, only the courts can decide that.
Every transition to a new administration is a chance for a new system and another chance for Nigeria to rise and fly. A new government represents an opportunity for Nigeria to realise its potential.
Unfortunately, that has not always been the case in the recent past as every new administration has ended up dashing the hopes of the people.
This sad fact has made Nigerians suspicious of politics and all office holders, rightly so. We pray and hope that those who providence has put in charge of the country from May 29, 2023 would break this cycle of one step forward and two steps backward.
A typical example is the immediate past administration of President Muhammadu Buhari that came with a lot of promise and in the end was adjudged worse than the Goodluck Jonathan government that it displaced! Numbers do not lie.
Before Muhammadu Buhari became president in 2015 the number of Nigerians that were killed by Boko Haram and other violent non-state actors were put at 35,000 between 2009 and 2015 according to data from Global Centre for Responsibility to Protect. That figure of violent deaths almost doubled under Buhari as over 63,000 Nigerians were killed under his watch. According to data obtained from Nigeria Security Tracker, NST, a project of the Council on Foreign Relations Africa Programme based in the United States, 63,111 Nigerians have been killed since Buhari assumed office on May 29, 2015. According to the data the deaths were caused by terrorism, banditry, herders/farmers clashes, communal crises, cult clashes and extra-judicial killings among others. Under the Buhari administration insecurity expanded from the North East to North West, North Central, South East and indeed all over the country.
In the area of management of the economy, inflation rose from 9 percent under Goodluck Jonathan in 2015 to over 22 percent at the end of the Buhari administration and brought with it economic hardships including two recessions and the country emerged the poverty capital of the world. Under President Olusegun Obasanjo Nigeria exited the Paris Club of heavily indebted nations and leaders after Obasanjo began to borrow again to the level that we are now where Nigeria’s foreign debt that was $10.32billion in 2015 is now $40.06billion and we are still borrowing.
In terms of corruption the Buhari administration left it worse than its predecessor despite the fact that war against corruption was one of the core reasons why Nigerians voted for him in 2015. If in doubt, let us see what the numbers are saying. In the 2020 corruption perception index the country scored 25 out of 100 points -with zero signifying the worst performing countries and 100 the best ranked. It also dropped to 149 out of the 180 countries surveyed, making it the second most corrupt country in West Africa. The 2020 rating is one point below that of 2019 when the country scored 26points and two points below its ranking in 2018 and 2017 when it got 27 points. This is the unbiased verdict of Buhari’s anti-corruption campaign by Transparency International (TI).
The list of sectors that got worse under the previous administration is endless, that is why it is necessary that Tinubu be conscious of this and works hard to break the jinx of every administration becoming worse than its predecessor.
President Tinubu can gain the support of the nearly 15million Nigerian voters who did vote for him by solving the nation’s multifaceted problems. He can start by unifying the country once again. Nigeria has never been more divided like it was in the last eight years.
The country is in dire need of a unifier. In this respect Tinubu’s job is cut out for him, especially with his Muslim-Muslim ticket which added and exacerbated the division. This however provides a golden opportunity for him to show that Christians have nothing to fear in his administration. It can only be seen when Nigerians see and feel that he is fair in making balanced appointments as well as in siting development projects across the country.
Not a few Nigerians raised an eyebrow when Tinubu constituted his Transition Committee and no one from the South East was found worthy to be on the list. Tinubu should avoid the lure of dividing the country into 5 percenters and 95 percenters of the Buhari era, that error deepened the division in the country.
Tinubu has to get the economy right and curtail the high level of inflation and unemployment which had been adjudged one of the worst in the world. It is as a result of the bad state of the economy that we are having our youths, the most productive age group in the country, looking for any available means to get out of the country.
We are in dire need of doctors and nurses, yet such highly skilled Nigerians are leaving every day. The state of the economy and poor remuneration does not allow them to stay. Our own skilled hands have become hotcakes in the United Kingdom, United States, the Gulf Region and indeed everywhere but Nigeria.
The new administration must tackle the insecurity challenge head-on. Insecurity is one of the reasons why our agricultural sector is performing below installed capacity because bandits and other terrorists do not allow farmers free access to their farms. This has impacted adversely on food security thus increasing poverty across the board but particularly in the rural areas.
Insecurity has in general reduced economic activities around the country with dire consequences for the health of our economy. In 2015 Nigerians were told that they needed a General to fix the insecurity, but the General tried and failed and the responsibility has once again fallen on a ‘bloody civilian’ to fix it.
Can Tinubu succeed where others have failed? Time will tell. Before I forget, among the things inherited from Buhari by Tinubu are hundreds of Nigerians in kidnappers’ den, including the Chibok Girls. President Tinubu should get them home. He is now the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria!
Finally, this columnist wishes that the dreams of heroes past find fulfillment under Tinubu Presidency. We wish him and Nigerians a better experience and many years of fatness, peace and security!
Many states have new governors, this column wishes and looks forward to writing on the successes of these brand-new governors as they unfold their plans for their various states.
I will be happy to see these new governors succeed where their predecessors may have failed. States such as Benue, Abia and Cross River are states to watch their new governors. These states have good promise but were sadly held down by poor governance. This column will gladly report first hand on the happy hour in Akwa Ibom. Happy New Era to all Nigerians!
MAY NIGERIA REBOUND
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