Bolanle Bolawole names leaders who ruined Nigeria
Editor’s note: Nigeria is currently facing many challenges. Many blame President Muhammadu Buhari for the country’s problems.
However, Bolanle Bolawole says that the roots of all troubles lie deep. He names 10 Nigerian politicians which probably ruined the country.
Buhari is fighting too many battles on too many fronts at one
The people’s patience is running thin. I studied history and do know that many revolutions occurred not at the peak of the people’s suffering but at the point that reformers began to tackle the rot.
The people’s patience often snap when the pace of reform is not fast enough and its dividends are slow in coming. A man called me last week: He did not receive a salary from his employers in the whole of 2015. A whole year; no salary! Not even half a month! Banks and oil companies are downsizing; thousands are being thrown out of employment. This is in addition to the torrents of school leavers joining the market.
It bears repeating that the economy should be the focus for now – the Central Bank of Nigeria and the commercial banks especially. Without a stable naira, the best of efforts will not amount to much. This administration needs a powerful think-thank on the economy; non-partisanship should be the name of the game right now. It bears repeating also that Buhari is fighting too many battles on too many fronts at one and same time. , judges\lawyers, corruption; within his own party there are disgruntled elements working to sabotage him as fifth columnists. Ruminating on the country’s parlous state, I came to the conclusion that 10 past leaders should be held responsible for the rain that is beating us right now.
1. Yakubu Gowon
Number one is Yakubu Gowon. His regime started the sensationalizing of corruption. Remember the Aper Aku versus Joseph Tarka bribe scandal. Gowon also laid the foundation of wastage of national resources: Read about his extravagant State wedding in Prof. Wole Soyinka’s “The Man Died”. He is also credited with the statement “money is not our problem but how to spent it”. Had he spent wisely, we would have started the elusive diversification of our mono-cultural economy during his time. Today, Gowon gallivants all over the place purporting to pray for Nigeria. He should instead pray for himself!
2. Olusegun Obasanjo
Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo is the number two. Corruption was still tolerable during Obasanjo’s first coming, although there were innuendoes surrounding his Operation Feed the nation\Operation Fool the Nation.
Handing over power to the National Party of Nigeria, with Alhaji Shehu Shagari as president, was an unpardonable crime committed against this country by Obasanjo, who pretended not to know that the process of national development is a deliberate process of picking and choosing the leaders with the right competencies for the task at hand. NPN was a party of predators and the impunity everywhere seen today started with them. Remember NPN National Chairman Adisa Akinloye’s special champagne and Umaru Dikko’s rice armada?
3. Shehu Shagari
Shagari was noted only for his high-rise cap. Were Alhaj Lai Mohamed in politics during this period, he would have described Shagari as “clueless and incompetent”. So Shehu Shagari is number three.
4. Ibrahim Babangida
Ibrahim Babangida, the self-styled evil genius, the one who marvelled that this country’s economy “defies logic” institutionalised the “settlement” syndrome, transformed corruption into high art and began the systematic ruination of the economy and the mindless devaluation of the naira. He is number four.
5. Ernest Shonekan
Chief Ernest Shonekan, as interim national government chairman, ruled for less than three months; I cannot remember him for anything but because he was so spineless as to have allowed Sani Anbacha to become head of state, he did this country great disservice. If he had been man enough to retire Abacha and the other goons who later laid siege to this country, he would have been a hero. Reports said a gun was put to his head as he was forced to write\read his resignation letter; I think a mere kitchen knife would have done the job! These days when I see him parade as an also-ran, I mutter to myself, what a mockery! He is number five.
6. Sani Abacha
Number five is the dark-goggled one, Sani Abacha. Who will ever forget the state-orchestrated bombings and murders undertaken by Jabilla, aka Sergeant Rogers, for Abacha? Till tomorrow, humungous amounts in hard currencies stolen by Abacha continued to be discovered in all corners of the world. Sadly, however, the recovered loot has, in turn, been looted as the ongoing probe of the ONSA has revealed.
7. Abdulsalami Abubakar
After Abacha came Abdulsalami Abubakar, who spent less than two years in office. The palatial building he built within this short time on Minna Hilltop, rivalling IBB’s, and the depletion of the country’s foreign reserves during his time, detracts from whatever credit his handing over power in 1999 might have attracted unto him. In addition, MKO Abiola, winner of the June 12, 1993 election, was murdered during Abdulsalami’s watch. He is number seven.
8. Umaru Yar’Adua
Umaru Yar’Adua died in office in circumstances that almost scattered the country. While he was on the sick bed, a cabal mercilessly plundered the country and a man said to be on life-support supposedly “signed” the nation’s budget in far-away Saudi Arabia. Only providence saved Nigeria under Yar’Adua. He is number eight.
9. Goodluck Jonathan
The number ten, of course, is Ijaw man, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan. Nigerians fought for him to become acting president and later president but he proved a complete let-down. He was through and through clueless and incompetent, as Lai Mohamed had depicted him. Worse, his government may as well go down into the records as the most corrupt in Nigeria’s annals.
Buhari is back in the saddle as an elected president, carrying the shit of all 10 leaders before him. He escaped censure at his first coming; it remains to be seen whether he will come clean on his second. On his first as well as second, Obasanjo received the knock. Atonement for sin is sine qua non for the healing process; carrying on as if nothing sordid happened is an aberration.
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