el-Rufai’s cant, and Michelle’s canticles

Kaduna State Governor Nasir el-Rufai is never one to be fazed by controversy and has never cowered before even the fiercest gale. Besides, he has over the years built some reputation for brutal rhetoric in putting his views across. And he apparently enjoys the heat that gets generated.

Only last month, he said some 67 percent of Southern Kaduna indigenes had already determined not to vote for him in the impending general election, adding that would not change were he to name the very Pontiff of Rome as his running mate in the poll. He was speaking in defence of his choice of Hadiza Balarabe, a fellow Moslem, for that office in a state so sensitive to ethno-religious fault line as Kaduna.

Among other controversies, the Kaduna governor ignited a row way back in April 2017 over public office financials when he confronted the National Assembly with the popular notion that its funding procedures lack transparency. The row that resulted from his comment at that time snowballed into being famously headlined with rare public disclosure of the official (emphasis intended) remuneration of the governor, and that for House of Representatives Speaker Yakubu Dogara who had picked up the gauntlet. Thus, that controversy afforded many Nigerians the closest peek they ever got into monthly pay slips of public officials, who are widely perceived to be among the most highly remunerated in the world.

But the latest controversy involving the Kaduna governor isn’t by any modicum nearly as edifying. el-Rufai’s last week threatened that foreign powers planning to interfere in Nigeria’s imminent general election will “go back in body bags.”

While on a Nigerian Television Authority prime programme, Tuesday Night Live, the Kaduna governor apparently intended a rejoinder to an advocacy by opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for greater involvement of the international community in Nigeria’s electoral process, when he said: “Those that are calling for anyone to come and intervene in Nigeria, we are waiting for the person that would come and intervene, they would go back in body bags…Nobody will come to Nigeria and tell us how to run our country…”

el-Rufai spoke against the backdrop of a concert of statements issued by the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union on the heels of the recent suspension of Hon. Justice Walter Onnoghen as Chief Justice of Nigeria by President Muhammadu Buhari. Those powers, in their statements, had argued that the crisis in the judiciary undermined the tenets of democracy and the principle of separation of powers, and in some way threatened the credibility of the forthcoming general election.

The Presidency and ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) took strong exception to those statements and butted back against perceived meddling in Nigeria’s internal affairs. The PDP, however, applauded and canvassed wider involvement. It should be obvious it is a sad commentary on our nationhood profile that we so distrust internal competencies in managing our affairs that we eagerly invite other nations to intervene, as opposition PDP has lately been doing. But this tendency isn’t peculiar to the PDP, because All Progressives Congress (APC) members did as much when they were in opposition prior to the 2015 general election.

‘It is difficult to see how the threat that anyone could end up in body bags…could be anything other than the lowest of all lows in hate speech’

Even then, you can’t diminish the relevance of foreign attention to our electoral process because Nigeria is a reputed member of the international community, and democracy is a global code of practice regarding which no country can credibly claim peculiar exemptions. Besides, it is difficult to see how the threat that anyone could end up in body bags, for whatever reason, could be anything other than the lowest of all lows in hate speech. Not that the media platform on which the governor spoke could have done much to screen his comment in line with the broadcast code, as it was a live programme.

Following the firestorm his comment generated, el-Rufai offered a makeover. He explained in another interview, Wednesday on Channels Television, that he made the ‘body bag’ comment because he had intelligence report that the PDP was trying to instigate the international community to give Nigeria the ‘Venezuelan’ treatment. “What I said is based on intelligence that is available to us that the opposition is preparing grounds to cause a crisis in Nigeria by inviting foreign participation…They know that they are likely to lose the elections…We welcome international observers. We invited them, and we want them to be part of the process and we will protect them. But they are here to observe and not to intervene or to provide the foundation for crises in Nigeria, which is what the PDP is preparing for.” he explained inter alia.

For a governor who once pursued a $350million infrastructural development loan for his state from the World Bank, the intensity of insular hostility to foreign role in Nigerian electoral process as implied in the ‘body bag’ comment was quite shocking. And it isn’t as if these foreign interests do not have any material stake in the process. Besides that their observation helps the international credibility of our elections as well as put our political actors in a glass bowl, the EU, among the others, reported having contributed €26.5million as at early last year to initiatives aimed at ensuring that Nigeria’s 2019 general election is successful.

We must also acknowledge, though, that it is only a few days away from the 2019 elections and partisan brinksmanship in the political class has hit feverish pitch. Foreign powers must thus be keenly wary of being drawn into the fray by their voiced opinions or actions in regard of the elections. Still, we must hold our power actors, especially principal actors by virtue of the public offices they hold, strictly accountable for the political culture they model. The ‘body bag’ comment by Mr. el-Rufai was hate speech in the extreme, and the makeover after-the-fact fell below par as damage control. That comment does not reflect who we are as a people in the global community and should by no means be used to benchmark the perception of our political culture, or indeed the 2019 elections, by the world.

Counsel from Michelle Obama

A video of Michelle Obama went viral recently on the social media. In that video, the former United States First Lady gave a stump speech to a youthful audience on the importance of participating in the electoral process. Her message has uncanny relevance for us as we go into the 2019 poll in a few days, hence my running an excerpt as follows for our instruction:

“I am sick of all the chaos and the nastiness of our politics. It’s exhausting. And frankly, it’s depressing.  So I understand your wanting to shut it all out, and just go on and try to live your life, to take care of your family in peace. But here’s the problem: while some folks are frustrated and tuned out and staying at home on election day, trust me other folks are showing up. Democracy continues with or without you. They’re voting in every election: from city council, to governor, to president. Because the folks who are voting know the impact that the leaders they pick can have on every single part of our lives.

When you don’t vote, you’re letting other people make some really key decisions about the life you gonna live, the place you’re gonna live, how it’s gonna work out for you. You’re just saying: ‘you do it.’ And you may not like what they decide. You might not like living with the consequences of other people’s choices.  But that’s what happens when you stay home.  You’re essentially putting your future in the hands of others. And the truth is, that’s exactly what some folks are hoping that you’ll do…

“The only way to make change in this country is to get out and vote for the change you’re looking for…I don’t care who you vote for...Presidential elections in districts are decided by 50 people who decided not to vote. It is that small of a margin. It is not about the leader. The power of our democracy is in us. The person that you’re looking for is standing in your shoes. You are the person that can save yourself from this. We are our heroes, we are our leaders. That doesn’t change. And it doesn’t matter who runs, it’s on us.”