The post-presidential poll crisis panel in Nigeria has submitted its report, strongly indicting the failed candidate of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) Major-General Muhammadu Buhari as having contributed to the widespread blood-letting and destruction of properties through unguarded and fiery rhetoric.
The report also blames other Nigerian political leaders, along with outrageous remunerations for elected lawmakers, for heightening tension and stoking resentment across the country.
General Buhari, a self-styled no-nonsense crusader for ethical revolution in Nigeria has always been seen from his military days as unwilling to accept and respect elected civil authorities. He actively participated in the 1983 coup that ousted the duly elected government of President Shehu Usman Shagari. The leadership he provided after toppling Shagari cared little about sensitive geo-political and religious balancing in Nigeria. The retired General’s contempt for elected civilian authorities is also believed to have influenced his disrespectful relationship with successive civilian administrations of Olusegun Obasanjo, the late Umaru Musa Yar’Adua and lately, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan.
Submitting the panel’s report to President Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja yesterday, the Sheik Ahmed Lemu- led panel noted that “provocative utterances by many individuals, and the widespread charge by prominent politicians, including the CPC presidential candidate, to the electorate ‘to guard their votes’ appeared to have been misconstrued by many voters to include recourse to violence which they did.” He explained that “a long interactive session was held between the CPC presidential candidate and five-member delegation of the panel, led by the chairman, in the office of the CPC presidential candidate in Kaduna on September 14, 2011.
It was discovered that he himself was a victim of the violence and of the destruction of his property, the photographs of which were given to the said delegation.” The chairman said that the basic cause of the violence in nearly all the communities concerned was political, stressing that ethno-religious sentiments were brought into the issue through negative campaigns and rumor-mongering by unscrupulous individuals to achieve their ulterior motives.
He added that the zoning controversy in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which started basically as internal political affairs of the ruling party, ultimately changed the nature of the presidential election into ethno-religious contest in the country, particularly in the northern states. Lemu said: “The next major cause of violence and disturbances is the manner in which political office holders have lucratized their respective positions at the expense of the whole nation.
The panel discovered that the remunerations and allowances of the members of the legislature, in particular, are considered by stakeholders who addressed us or wrote to us about the issue to be outrageous. “It has turned politics in Nigeria to a do-or-die for which many politicians of all parties are seriously establishing private armies to execute. In that respect, easy access to drugs, serious general poverty at the grassroots level and youth unemployment, in particular, are providing many foot soldiers ready for recruitment at a cheap rate. The security agencies could verify this assertion also.”
He noted that the first and probably the most important major cause was the failure of the previous successive regimes since the military handover of power in 1999 to implement the recommendations of various committees, commissions and panels that had taken place in our nation.
According to him, that failure on the part of government facilitated the widespread sense of impunity in the culprits and perpetrators of crimes and violence in the Nigerian society While calling on Jonathan to revisit previous recommendations in past reports on crimes and violence, the panel said that perpetrators of violence must be fished out and prosecuted The panel, therefore, said that government should revisit the Justice Bolarinwa Babalakin Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Bauchi State Civil Disturbance, the Karibi- Whyte Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Kafanchan Disturbance, the Niki Tobi Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Plateau State Disturbance, the Justice Snakey Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Wase and Langtang Disturbances; the Justice Disu Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Plateau State Disturbances; Prof. Tamuno Panel of Inquiry on National Security and Justice Muhammadu Uwais Electoral Reform Committee. Lemu said the recommendations were based on what the panel gathered from many victims of those previous disturbances who were nursing reprisals and had only been waiting for the slightest excuse to retaliate as they did during the 2011 election violence and civil disturbances.
Another major cause of the electoral violence, Lemu added, was the existing widespread desire for change as a result of frustration and disappointment of members of the public on the inability of past regimes to solve the problems of electricity problems nationwide. He also listed others to include deplorable state of federal roads throughout the country, bribery and corruption “which have virtually been legitimised in all affairs of our nation.”
The chairman explained that the general insecurity of life and property and kidnappings were also responsible for the frustration and disappointment, saying that the true state of affairs could escalate to social revolution if preventive measures were not taken in time. He noted that the current demonstrations in educational institutions and labour unions were signals of more serious negative events to come. Lemu stated that his committee recommended that the heads of the three arms of government and other stakeholders should come together and agree on the way forward to tackle bribery and corruption to avoid the impending catastrophe.
The panel also recommended that compensation should be paid to the victims to ameliorate their suffering.
President Jonathan assured that government would look into the recommendations of the panel, saying that it would not be swept under the carpet. He said: “On our part, we will follow your recommendations. You did mention that one of the problems is that when recommendations are made to government, government hardly implements them.
“But we have decided that even in the Jos crisis, in fact just this morning I was saying to the Secretary to Government of the Federation, we have set up a committee, we are going to look at all the recommendations and we must issue white papers, heavens will not fall.
“Until government has the political will and encouraged to do what is right, no matter how painful it will be, the culture of impunity will continue.”
“My interest is that in 2015 elections and beyond what must we do is make sure that what we experienced doesn’t happen again. I am quite pleased you concentrated in that area.” “You raised the issues bothering on power sector because without power you cannot empower people economically, the economic situation, the roads, corruption and other issues, all these lead to one thing that if the economy improves and if people can go to school, surely some of these ugly incidences will be minimised and I agree with you.
“The social issues, of course you mention something bothering on compensation we will look at it. You also mentioned the national orientation agency, we have been discussing we have to strengthen that agency to work closely with the ministry of information to be because government has a number of radio and TV stations in every state and we believe they should be able to use these stations to engaged to enlighten and educate Nigerians on security.”
Additional reports courtesy of National Mirror.