By Odimegwu Onwumere
“Balarabe Musa is one of Nigeria’s brightest stars of integrity and sterling principles. The octogenarian has lived to his reputation by avoiding any conduct associated with corruption and dishonour. Even Musa’s worst enemies and critics cannot dispute his remarkable reputation for integrity and selfless service to the people.” – Muhammadu Buhari
At 81, Abdulkadir Balarabe Musa who is regarded as a left-wing Nigerian politician, elected Governor of Kaduna State, during the Nigerian Second Republic, has remained an outspoken loyalist to the downtrodden, hapless and defocused Nigerians, who are enduring charlatanic governance under the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led government of Nigeria. Musa who probably would not have owned a house of his own if not that he took a loan about 40 years ago of which he balanced recently, has spoken truth to the mendacious APC government.
Musa, the National Chairman of Peoples Redemption Party, PRP, with an undamaged acumen not always known of persons of his age, news has it that while speaking at the 54th National Executive Committee of the party in Kaduna on December 12 2017, had the following words for the retrogressed and aberration known as APC: “The economy remains comatose, and in some sectors, particularly in industry and commerce, it is even getting worse. Monetary and fiscal management have continued to lack coherence and consistency, or even predictability and strategic planning.
“Unemployment, particularly among the youths, who constitute the bulk of our population, has assumed critical proportions and is now, for all practical purposes, a national emergency. Yet, this APC administration, which rode to power on the back of false promises to this generation of hapless young men and women, seems to have no answers to this ticking time bomb beyond slogans such as N-Power.
“In the name of an anti-corruption campaign, the government has been consistently assaulting Due Process and the Rule of Law. Court orders are flagrantly disobeyed by the very institutions that should enforce them. Basic democratic rights are being cynically abused.
“While talking glibly about fighting corruption, the government shamelessly looks askance where corruption is exposed within its own very ranks, closets and cocoons. APC, both at the centre and the states it controls, has proved that it has little or nothing else to provide Nigerians other than further mass impoverishment, frustration and hardship.”
While the Major General Muhammadu-led APC government has shown that it lags the tenets of positive leadership in the points raised above by Musa but with a PhD in propaganda, you wonder what is then an impeachable offense that a president should commit before he is shown the exit door in the office. T
The governened are enduring untoward hardship as they are experiencing under the government of Buhari in the name of democracy.
Musa has shown that he is not and cannot be like the Senate leader, Ali Ndume (APC, Borno South), who on July 25 2016, said in an interview that Buhari cannot be impeached, because he has not been faithful to any impeachable offence. In the same month of that year, the Nigerian House of Representatives corroborated what the Senate had said through Ndume.
Chief Whip of the House, Alhassan Doguwa was the garrulous ‘speaker’ for the lower chamber. Whereas the Senate and House of Reps exonerated the president of impeachment, it is still fresh in our hearts that the DSS was unashamedly above board in its excesses in this government, Army, Police, Fulani herdsmen and Boko haram were also defiantly everywhere in this government.
Remember that the Nigerian Police was rated the worst in the world few weeks ago, according to World Internal Security and Police Index International, WISPI. But apart from the fact that Nigerians are roasting under Buhari and some persons were saying that he had not committed an impeachable offense, the retention of the (il)legal Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ibrahim Magu, upon the rejection of Magu by the Senate, had been said is one impeachable offense.
We should not even remember the brain behind Maina’s return. According to Reno Omokri, the author of Facts Versus Fiction: The True Story of the Jonathan Years: Chibok, 2015 and Other Conspiracies, “This is even as the Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami had already revealed that he “acted in the public’s interest” in initiating the process for Maina’s return.” The $25 billion Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) fiddle which is regarded by opinion leaders as “the biggest scam ever in the history of Nigeria since 1914 to date” could also have been “in public interest”.
Omokri, about five months ago, said that the former President Goodluck Jonathan made mistakes, but Buhari is a mistake. Omokri is not far from the truth. Buhari is not just a mistake but a failure in governance that many of us shouted about during his emergence as APC’s presidential candidate in the 2015, that he will finally not prove critics wrong.
Taking to Twitter of the lies of the Buhari government, Omokri wrote that before the APC came into power, Babatunde Raji Fashola, SAN, and currently the Federal Minister of Power, Works and Housing and was Lagos State Governor from May 29, 2007 to May 29, 2015, had in 2014 promised stable electricity, if only the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) is voted out.
“However, he is now blaming Jonathan, for reducing electricity tariff. Buhari will do well moving @tundefashola from being in charge of generating power for Nigeria to being in charge of generating excuses for govt,” Omokri mocked them. “The main difference between GEJ/PDP and PMB/APC is that @GEJonathan made his mistakes as President while @MBuhari is a mistake as President. The major difference between the PDP and the APC is that whereas the PDP had some confirmed liars as members, the APC is itself a lie!”
Against that influence, Buhari spent the vital parts of his first year in office junketing around the world without a cabinet. Buhari stayed in the office without a cabinet knowing or unknowing that the different states depend on the Federation Account to survive. Buhari had a view that he was preparing for the best for the country, oblivious that his action was for the worse. Six months without a functional cabinet of ministers, ambassadors and so on, were enough to damage the country’s economy than just recession. And here we are!
However, speaking in an interview on April 2 2017, Senator Femi Okurounmu, regarded as a die-hard Awoist, said that the president might be impeached, on the appointment of the Magu, if he refuses to follow the constitution. In the words of Okurounmu, “There are two issues involved here. If the Senate rejects Magu and the president allows him to act, that is an impeachable offence. If our legislature is up to the task, if our lawmakers know their rights and they are men of honour, that is enough to impeach the president.”
Hmmm. Hardly is anyone talking on the hyper-kept secret of the health condition of Buhari since January 19 2017, we read then in the news that he sent a letter to the senate in respect of this. The senate did not see him, but saw the letter. Since then, Nigeria has been sick as their president is sick.
It is the odious of governments that Buhari is heading that pushed Musa to weep that at 81, he is not yet fulfilled, while fielding questions to journalists on October 27 2017. It is this type of nuisance called democracy under Buhari that made Musa to regret the 57 years of Independence from the rapacious British colonial masters. He said, “At 81, I will say I feel great and I thank God for everything. But, I am not completely fulfilled because we are yet to have the country of our dreams. We are yet to have a country where there is equity and respect for rights and dignity of all citizens. We are yet to have a country where the governed are good followers and leaders think first about the people and not the other way round. I desire a better Nigeria where everyone will feel the impact of governance that is my birthday wish for the country.’’
Nevertheless, when this government expires someday, the remaining of us who were not killed by the Buhari hunger policies would remember Balarabe Musa as a man who spoke truth to power, when some others chickened out. We would remember Musa that it was his un-daunting courage for the elements of integrity that made Buhari to describe him as a “man of unassailable integrity and untainted record of public service” in a tribute to Musa on the occasion of his 81st birthday anniversary this year.
If Buhari apologists think they can keep the health of the president a secret, they cannot keep the fact that Nigerians are hungry under Buhari a secret; they cannot keep the killing and marauding Fulani herdsmen a secret, and many other deliberate abuses here and there under the Buhari-led APC government. These are the hardships being offered to Nigerians by the APC government, which Abdulkadir Balarabe Musa was not happy about.
Odimegwu Onwumere is a Poet, Writer and Media Consultant based in Rivers State. Tel: +2348032552855. Email: apoet_25@yahoo.com
