By Kassim Afegbua
To keep it honest about the North’s quest for the top job in Nigeria come 2027, is in our collective interest. Equity and fairness have to be upheld. While I quite appreciate that politics is an industry that thrives in the North, the equity thereof must be cogitated as we pursue our aspirations.
With twenty eight years in active politics under my belt, I am in position to speak to this issue; and over the years , I have seen broken promises, curious scenarios and faulty permutations.
To my mind, without the South, there is no way anybody can be president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria; similarly, without the North, there is no way anybody can be president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. We have an equally weighted hand-in-glove relation in respect of progress of our nation; and we are best off approaching national issues with equal assessment of each other.
A TALE OF TWO SCENARIOS
Former President Muhammadu Buhari tried to be president on three occasions, without campaigning in the South; and three times the outings hit the rock, just because his campaigns were lopsided. In one outing, he even got twelve million votes; nevertheless, it was not enough to make him president. The law talks about spread, and votes in two-thirds of the states of the federation. As we saw, when Buhari eventually collaborated with the South, he defeated an incumbent president, Goodluck Jonathan of Southern extraction to become president. With this background, it is pellucid that every geopolitical zone of the country is just as important to anyone’s aspiration as the other. A deliberate cockeyed arrogance, leaning towards any particular area brings the effort to dross.
The whispers about gambits being hatched in and by the North to produce the president in 2027, and alter the algorithm of power that guarantees balancing the wheel of power rotation, is suffusing the air. It portends to be a deleterious move that can set us all back. It would seem too propitious that we heed and apply wisdom by allowing the South a full eight year turn, rather than allow the upset that meddling with the current flow could bring, on several levels.
After President Buhari’s eight-year tenure, the natural thing is to allow the South complete an uninterrupted eight years to balance the rotation. The word that the North is plotting a comeback in 2027 is not only daunting; it actually offends the sensibilities of the South. It is apocryphal. Indeed it would be vexatious for any aspirant from the North to even attempt contesting when the South has not completed its turn. Moreover, if the rhythm of politics of rotation is altered, it would be tantamount to burning the bridges of the understanding that should naturally sustain the pillars of stability of our country. A Northern president in 2027 launched by way of whatever platform or ideology, could set us at odds and put us in retrograde.
We should be aiming at going away from this North-South dichotomy or polemic, and see ourselves as one, evincing palpable equity and justice, if we truly want to sustain national politics of homogeneity, driven by a deliberate and genuine desire to help deepen our politics for national progress, prosperity, and unity.
The South must be allowed to complete its turn of at least eight years, till 2031. Thereafter, it will be the turn of the North to succeed the government of the day. Those who are fanning the embers of discord by massing around political players should better revisit their thoughts, to avoid polarisation in an already delicate situation.
Any thought about 2027 and the North plotting a comeback should be spurned, as anything too hot to handle, to avoid any implosion. Such plots would be a direct insult to the South by every measure. The gossamer peace that presently exists in the country should be enriched by action, to give birth to entrenched democratic culture of rotational presidency, that would expunge the citizenry’s dissonance.
Give the South a chance to complete its own eight-year tenure without provocation. Trying to stage a comeback looks precarious. Let us espouse equity, fairness and wisdom.
Afegbua is a former Commissioner for Information in Edo State
