Obasanjo’s sudden change from ‘confused’ elder statesman to new ‘bride’

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who has recently been playing host to politicians from across the country, is now believed to be a beautiful bride whose support must be sought for parties hoping to win in the 2015 elections.

The popular aphorism that there is no permanent enemy in politics but permanent interest came to the fore recently as Nigeria’s politicians seemed to have shunned what social commentators described as politics of ideology in their pursuit of power. They have been variously demonstrating the dictum in their quest to woo major stakeholders in the country to support their respective course.

Nigeria’s politicians, majority of who are not known as promoters of any ideology, are always quick to use foul languages against perceived members of the opposition while pursuing their political interests, but will hire drums and other musical instruments to sing the praises of the opposition members when they are able to woo them to their parties.

The All Progressives Congress’ National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, and President Goodluck Jonathan appeared to have swallowed their pride and what pundits considered as derogatory comments against former President Olusegun Obasanjo in their respective bid to seek the support of the ex-President ahead of the 2015 general elections.

While Tinubu had personally visited the ex-President, Jonathan was represented by Senate President David Mark and a strong team including Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan; the Peoples Democratic Party Women Leader, Mrs. Josephine Anenih; and Senator Polycarp Nwite, among others to discuss issues bordering on the future of the country.

Former Oyo State governor and a chieftain of the Accord Party, Rashidi Ladoja, also visited the former President the same day.

According to analysts, Obasanjo has now become a beautiful bride whose support must be sought for political parties to win the next election, but they seemed to have forgotten the various tirades they have hauled at the former President in the past.

Shortly after the merger of the ACN, the All Peoples Party of Nigeria, the Congress for Progressives Change and a section of the All Progressives Grand Alliance to form the APC, the party leaders had stormed Obasanjo’s residence to introduce the party to the former President.

The APC chieftains, who had described Obasanjo as a bad leader, suddenly turned themselves to praise singers as they hailed the former President as a great leader whose major concern was the development of the country.

Among the APC leaders that spoke at the Obasanjo’s residence was Tinubu. He described the former President as an elder statesman. He had hailed him thus, “You have come out of tribulation and held the highest position in this country. We are here because of your courage. Nobody can claim that he has information more than you. You have surmounted a number of crises.

“Nigeria is divided now more than before. To realise a stable Nigeria, we want to encourage you to continue to speak the truth. We are resolved and determined to rescue Nigeria, we want you as navigator.”

He added, “It is to be able to set Nigeria on the right path and for all men of goodwill to come together to rescue Nigeria. It is not a matter of wooing him.

“Yes, Obasanjo is a very unique person in his own way based upon the experience of life, tribulations one way or the other. He saw power, tribulations and then came back to power. If you want to grasp the life of this man from zero to grace, zero again and then to grace. And then you will see what you get in such a person.

“And you will need that wisdom not necessarily to join our partisan politics, but just to draw from the experience of an elder statesman.”

The leader of the team, Chief Bisi Akande, further demonstrated the APC’s bid to seek Obasanjo’s support when he expressed the party’s support for the former President’s 18-page letter to Jonathan.

Going down memory lane, however, analysts recalled that Tinubu had been one of Obasanjo’s greatest antagonists. Tinubu began his tirades against Obasanjo in the build-up to the 2003 general elections conducted by the then Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Dr. Abel Guobadia.

The APC chieftain, who was then the Lagos State governor, felt aggrieved by Obasanjo’s plot to get the backing of the South-West states. The former President, who needed the region to get the PDP’s ticket for a second term in office, began moves, including meeting with the then South-West governors to support his ambition, but fortunately for him, all the governors except Tinubu supported the former President’s ambition and as a result postponed the local government elections they had planned to conduct in their various states.

Pundits, however, believe that this major development set the stage for dispute between the two “foes.” Obasanjo needed the support of the South-West, but Tinubu, his “political foe” refused to back the former president while describing him as “a myopic bull in a crowded china shop.”

The former governor had at a meeting on July 5, 2003, boasted that Obasanjo could not win the battle alone without the support of the South-West states. He had insisted that the former President needed the PDP-AD alliance to succeed.

He also added that Obasanjo was in “deep trouble politically” as the former President was trying to assert PDP’s supremacy in the South-West and hurting his position within the PDP by allowing his relationship with his vice, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, to drift.

Despite the fact that the defunct AD under which the South-West governors were elected had supported Obasanjo’s re-election bid, Tinubu had asked the former President to stop behaving autocratically.

“Obasanjo has to show he is willing to get out of his ivory tower and listen sometimes,” Tinubu had said.

Before then, the former Lagos State governor had blamed “Obasanjo’s woes on his inability to listen to independent advice and his lack of interpersonal skills.”

The APC chieftain had also described Obasanjo as someone who “has learnt the art of deception.”

Stressing that he could not trust the former President, Tinubu had said, “Anybody who has worn the uniform described as camouflage has learnt the art of deception and that is the way I see Obasanjo. He had meetings and meetings with the late MKO Abiola; I was with him, I believe four of us including, Dele Alake, and we ate amala and vegetable soup with hot pepper in Abiola’s house. Everybody was yawning, sweating and looking for water with MKO Abiola and Obasanjo behaving as if it was not as hot as we made it seem; behaving as if they had this deep understanding. Then, not up to two weeks after that, Obasanjo went away to Zimbabwe and announced from there that Abiola was not the messiah.

“Haba! After that, I developed that mistrust in him; I could not believe that a man could do that. Stand by some principles, stand by some integrity, stand transparently and honestly on matter of facts as you lead other people to believe you and support you as a key pillar.”

On the former President’s birthday, Tinubu had said, “I didn’t even remember his birthday. I opened the newspaper and saw it. There are many problems confronting us. I won’t blame anybody who doesn’t read my birthday greetings. I won’t blame them if they say they didn’t see it, there are many problems confronting the nation. There are many news items that are seriously more newsworthy than to be looking for Obasanjo’s congratulatory messages in the newspaper.

“A man who had great opportunity to put Nigeria on the right path and failed to do so; failed to do even the Ota road, not Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. What am I celebrating about him? That is the truth. He deceptively dealt with the country and he handed over to a man who he knew was ill. Obasanjo is a leader that could not find another successor capable of driving through his vision for the country.”

Tinubu’s ferocious criticism of Obasanjo became harsher during a speech at the presentation of a book titled: “Accidental Public Servant” written by a former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Mallam Nasir el- Rufai, while criticising Jonathan’s administration for its failure to provide good governance for Nigerians.

The APC chieftain had said, “The criminal third term enterprise of Obasanjo was being re-enacted by the administration of President Goodluck Jonathan.”

In the build-up to the 2011 general elections, Tinubu asked Nigerians not to vote for Jonathan, describing him as Obasanjo’s siamese twin and as such would misrule the country as the former President did.

Notwithstanding his claim that he and Obasanjo were friends, Tinubu had harsh words for the former President over the latter’s comment that the defunct ACN was crying foul over spilled milk after a governorship election in Kogi State.

Tinubu had said, “What integrity has Obasanjo in terms of his legacies for Nigeria to speak on elections? Apart from his aborted third term ambition, he brought about and left a legacy of electoral corruption in the country. What is Obasanjo talking about? He should go away and retire in shame politically. He should leave the political landscape of this country alone. He brought a whole salad of corruption, manipulation and failures.”

But Tinubu had recently returned to the earlier derided but now respected Obasanjo in Abeokuta to seek his opinion on some of the former President’s “old boys” who are currently seeking the APC presidential ticket for next year poll.

In a manner that showed that Tinubu had completely swallowed his earlier disparaging comments on Obasanjo, he praised the ex-President saying, “We are here to pay homage to our former President and discuss with him because he has a number of influences in the political sphere.

“We need to talk to him and find out his thinking about Nigeria and the future. We need to seek his observation on some of his former boys who are running for Presidency in our party.”

The PDP was also not left out in the race to seek Chief Obasanjo’s attention.

Mark, during the visit to him and Obasanjo’s residence some minutes after Tinubu had left the place, was said to have raised concern over the former President’s “unconcern attitude” towards PDP. He had expressed the belief that this might affect Jonathan’s re-election.

This development necessitated another move by the PDP National Chairman, Alhaji Adamu Mu’azu, to seek Obasanjo’s forgiveness.

Mu’azu offered the apology on behalf of the party in Abuja while welcoming defectors from the Labour Party, led by former Ogun State Governor, Otunba Gbenga Daniel, to the ruling party.

He said, “All of us must beg Obasanjo to forgive us. We need to beg him. He is very prayerful and we need to ask him to forgive us so that we can be forgiven. We are your children.”

“We have made mistakes and Baba, please forgive us. Come and lead us. We are your followers and we assure you that we are all good boys and girls. We have sinned. Baba please forgive us.”

It will be recalled that the robust relationship between Obasanjo and Jonathan snapped not long after the 2011 general elections. The breakdown of the relationship that could be described as that of father and son became glaring through exchange of open letters between them. The tone of the two letters, analysts said, left the impression of irreconcilable differences between both “combatants.”

Obasanjo, who felt that Jonathan had derailed from the expected path, quickly wrote a letter to him so as to return him to the path of honour. The former President had accused Jonathan, who he had supported to become the President, of training snipers for the purpose of unleashing terror against perceived political enemies and of allowing the PDP to slip in disarray, among others.

Twenty-one days after Obasanjo wrote him, Jonathan replied the former President and accused him of deliberate or inadvertently setting the stage for subversion. The President described Obasanjo’s letter as a threat to national security, adding that he had instructed security operatives to investigate all the allegations made the against him.

Jonathan accused Obasanjo of recommending policy he never implemented while in office as President, citing the Odi massacre during the administration of the former President as an example.

In Jonathan’s reply to Obasanjo, he had said, “More uncharitable persons may even see a touch of sanctimoniousness in your new belief in the carrot and stick approach to overcoming militancy and insurgency. You have always referred to how you hit Odi in Bayelsa State to curb militancy in the Niger Delta. If the invasion of Odi by the Army was the stick, I did not see the corresponding carrot. I was the Deputy Governor of Bayelsa State then, and as I have always told you, the invasion of Odi did not solve any militancy problem but, to some extent, escalated it. If it had solved it, the late President Yar’Adua would not have had to come up with the amnesty programme. And while some elements of the problem may still be there, in general, the situation is reasonably better.”

Jonathan hit Obasanjo harder when he said that the former President’s administration was characterised by kidnapping.

He said, “In terms of general insecurity in the country and particularly the crisis in the Niger Delta, 2007 was one of the worst periods in our history. You will recall three incidents that happened in 2007, which seemed to have been orchestrated to achieve sinister objectives. Here in Abuja, a petrol tanker loaded with explosives was to be rammed into the Independent National Electoral Commission building. But luckily for the country, an electric pole stopped the tanker from hitting the INEC building. It is clear that this incident was meant to exploit the general sense of insecurity in the nation at the time to achieve the aim of stopping the 2007 elections. It is instructive that you, on a number of occasions, alluded to this fact.

“When that incident failed, an armed group invaded Yenagoa one evening with the intent to assassinate me. Luckily for me, they could not. They again attacked and bombed my country home on a night when I was expected in the village. Fortunately, as God would have it, I did not make the trip. I recall that immediately after both incidents, I got calls expressing the concern of Abuja. But Baba, you know that despite the apparent concern of Abuja, no single arrest was ever made. I was then the Governor of Bayelsa State and the PDP Vice-Presidential candidate. The security people ordinarily should have unravelled the assassination attempt on me.

“You also raised the issues of kidnapping, piracy and armed robbery. These are issues all Nigerians, including me are very concerned about. While we will continue to do our utmost best to reduce all forms of criminality to the barest minimum in our country, it is just as well to remind you that the first major case of kidnapping for ransom took place around 2006. And the Boko Haram crisis dates back to 2002. Goodluck Jonathan was not the President of the country then. Also, armed robbery started in this country immediately after the civil war and since then, it has been a problem to all succeeding governments. For a former Head of Government, who should know better, to present these problems as if they were creations of the Jonathan administration is most uncharitable.”

On his reply to Obasanjo’s allegation of training snipers, Jonathan said, “I don’t know where you got that from but you do me grave injustice in not only lending credence to such baseless rumours, but also publicising it. You mentioned God 17 times in your letter. Can you, as a Christian, hold the Bible and say that you truly believe this allegation? The allegation of training snipers to assassinate political opponents is particularly incomprehensible to me. Since I started my political career as a Deputy Governor, I have never been associated with any form of political violence. I have been a President for over three years now, with a lot of challenges and opposition mainly from the high and mighty. There have certainly been cases of political assassination since the advent of our Fourth Republic, but as you well know, none of them occurred under my leadership.”

Jonathan again flayed Obasanjo as he described him as a confused man and unstable in his views regarding government’s handling of the protracted Boko Haram insurgency.

Jonathan, who spoke through his spokesperson, Reuben Abati, was reacting to Obasanjo’s comment in a CNN interview that the President had been deploying excessive force and exploring little or no dialogue in solving the Boko Haram problem.

“To deal with a group like that, you need a carrot and stick. The carrot is finding out how to reach out to them. When you try to reach out to them and they are not amenable to being reached out to, you have to use the stick,” Mr. Obasanjo reportedly said.

Concerned stakeholders, who appear not to be surprised by the new development, have expressed divergent opinions.

The founder of Oodua People’s Congress, Dr. Fredrick Fasehun, hailed Obasanjo for his large heart to receive the “characters” who thronged his residence for one favour or the other.

He said, “The former President is a senior statesman and these characters though they derided him in the past, they must have had some remorse which was why they visited him. I believe they must have believed that there is nothing they could achieve without his support, and that is why they went to see him.

“In the other way round, I see it as a mark of commendation for Obasanjo to have received them back. It depicted that they swallowed their pride. Nobody can be proud before Obasanjo. He holds a very crucial role in the politics of the country. I congratulate him for being patient with everyone and for being a groundbreaking man.”

The National Chairman of Labour Party, Chief Dan Nwanyanwu, said there was nothing wrong with the “new friendship” between Tinubu and Obasanjo, stating that everybody knew it was all about politics and the 2015 general elections.

He, however, said he would not be able to comment freely on the closed-door meeting between the two political leaders because he was not in attendance.

Nwanyanwu said, “If there was a communiqué issued in respect of the meeting, I would have been able to freely comment, but there is none. But actually, there is freedom of movement and speech in this era of democracy. Anybody can go to wherever they like to discuss issues. Everybody knows it is all about politics and elections. It was a closed-door meeting which no one heard what they discussed and I have no insinuations about that.

“Anybody can meet with the former president. You can say Tinubu and others went to visit him; very soon, you can also hear that Atiku Abubakar has visited also. No one is restricted from visiting him.”

But to a social commentator and poet, Mr. Odia Ofeimu, the closed-door meeting between Tinubu and Obasanjo was of no relevance to the future of Nigeria. He said there should be no restriction from visiting anyone in the country despite political differences.

He said, “The meeting has no relevance to anything; it has no impact on politics. Meanwhile, anyone can visit anyone anywhere, but there has to be a relevance of such to the future of Nigeria.

“Political differences should not determine how people relate in the country and anybody has the moral right to correct his mistakes and seek apology if they had had disagreements before whether in the secret or in the open.”