Bankole has eyes, but colours reality
By Owei Lakemfa
HOUSE of Representatives Speaker, Dimeji Bankole boasted before a visiting delegation of German parliamentarians that the mass uprisings that buried the Tunisian and Egyptian governments cannot happen in Nigeria.
Speaking through the Chairman of the House Committee on Defence, Oluwale Oke, he argued that Nigeria has immunity from the type of peoples power that is sweeping through at least nine countries, because Nigerians accept democracy.
The Egyptian uprising which has become the model, had seven basic ingredients. The first was a revolt against a fossilized leadership which had occupied the presidency for three decades. It is a fact that this type of dictatorship does not exist in Nigeria, so Bankole is right that this will not ignite protests in the country.
The second is the insensitivity of the Egyptian ruling class to the plight of the people. This is the same scenario in Nigeria. A third reason was that Egypt had an arrogant ruling party that assumed it was its birthright to rule the country.
Similarly, the Nigerian ruling party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) assumes that it is its destiny to rule the country. In fact, it has allocated to itself, a minimum 60 years to rule Nigeria.
This is regardless of its performance in office or of any credible challenge. In fact, the primary reason Alhaji Atiku Abubakar abandoned the opposition Action Congress of Nigeria and returned to the PDP where he had to beg for a waiver and fight to be a consensus “candidate” is the belief that whoever became the presidential candidate of the PDP automatically becomes the president of the country.
A fourth ingredient of the Egyptian uprising is the massive corruption of the political elite. Despite sermons and claims to fighting corruption, it has become part of state craft in Nigeria. It is debatable, which is more corrupt: the Egyptian or Nigerian ruling elite.
A fifth reason for the uprising was the rising costs of food and general inflation; this is the same reality in Nigeria. A sixth is mass unemployment which is also a major scourge in Nigeria, while the seventh is increasing poverty and hunger. This has also been the lot of Nigerians.
Like in Egypt, the wealth of the Nigerian federation is shared by a few; this is so serious that the National Assembly alone swallows at least one fifth of the federal recurrent expenditure.
The Assembly has consistently denied this, but the fact is that it has refused to make public, the monthly allocation that goes to each Senator or Honourable.
As analysed, of the seven main ingredients that led to the revolution in Egypt, six are present in Nigeria. So, the assertion of Bankole that a revolt by the Nigerian people is impossible, is a fallacious one.
Also, the vehicles of mobilisation, including cell phones and its facility of text messaging, the internet, satellite television, radio and other means of social communication are all present and available in Nigeria.
His argument that the Nigerian polity is stable and therefore, a revolt is impossible, fails to take two primary things into consideration. First is that just last month, the Egyptian polity was considered quite stable; a stability that has been assumed for decades.
Yet within 19 days, the Hosni Mubarak regime was gone. The other point is: What criteria is used to measure political stability? Can a country be said to be stable politically just because the elites rotate power amongst themselves?
If this be so, then Italy that has a history of governments rising at dawn and falling at dusk can be said to be the most stable in the world, yet we know that its constant change of leadership since the end of the Second World War is actually a sign of an unstable polity.
Bankole made a simplistic conclusion that Nigeria is a democracy because elections are held periodically; Mubarak held elections religiously, yet he ran a dictatorship.
In Uganda, Yoweri Museveni has just won another round of presidential elections yet he has been in power for 25 years. Basically, the handover of power from one politician to another is no proof that we are a democracy.
We cannot be a democracy if the will of the electorate is subverted or sovereignty does not belong to the people but to those in power. We cannot be a democracy if the people have no right to food, the children have no right to education and there are no tangible dividends for the people.
Bankole takes the seeming calmness of the waters for its depth. Tunisia was similarly calm, until a street fruit vendor immolated himself in frustration; nobody thought an uprising was afoot; not even those who began the protests.
The events in Egypt were inspired by the Tunisian revolution, which is an indication that ideas do not need visas to cross boundaries.
If Egypt, Algeria, Jordan, Bahrain, Libya, Yemen, Sudan and Morocco, most of which are better run than Nigeria can be effected by people uprisings, it will be illusory to think that Nigeria has immunity. The challenge therefore is not to boast, but to address the root causes which include grinding poverty, mass unemployment, massive corruption and lack of basic welfare.
Another false claim made to the German delegation is that “our Armed Forces regretted ever dabbling into governance”. Being in governance was a very lucrative business for them and that is why so many retired military officers are occupying political offices today.
It is not that the military elite regret its 29 year misrule, but that the Nigerian people have made it known that they will no longer condone such criminality. Also, professional coup plotters realise that to a large extent, the international community will not condone the seizure of political power by any gang.
The Nigerian political elites should not play deaf to the thundering and rumbling around them; they need to open their eyes to the reality that if they continue to treat democracy as an unbroken merriment with access to free funds, an Egyptian-type uprising is possible.
