Special to USAfrica magazine (Houston) and USAfricaonline.com, first Africa-owned, US-based newspaper published on the Internet.
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Dr. Chidi Amuta is Executive Editor of USAfrica — since 1993
President Bola Tinubu has dealt a fatal punch on Nigeria’s democratic prospects. As the head of the executive branch, he has injured the judiciary and subverted the legislature in what promises to be a dangerous drift towards authoritarianism. On the Rivers crisis, the Supreme Court ruled on the side of deploying democratic methods to resolve outstanding issues in the crisis. The embattled Governor, Mr. Similayi Fubara was in the process of obeying the Supreme Court when Tinubu struck a lethal political blow.
The President hastily announced a suspension of the governor and his deputy as well as all democratic structures in the state. He appointed a sole administrator
for the state and inaugurated Mr. Ebas, a retired Navy Chief to run the oil rich State as he deems fit for the next six months. The Attorney General of the federation has tacitly admitted that the presidential action may have been somewhat hasty but in a bid to avert an anticipated ugly security situation, for fear of what had not yet taken place. But the constitution provided for real credible security threats or real insecurity, not speculative fears lurking in the unknown future.
The expectation that the National Assembly could overturn the strange emergency declaration has also been dubiously subverted. Instead of a straightforward electronic or manual vote countfollowed by a numerical , the two arms of the National Assembly adopted a nebulous voice vote to quickly approve the presidential declaration of an emergency over Rivers state. Hardly any informed debate on the matter took place. Scarcely any review of the security situation necessitating the emergency declaration. Just a robotic rubber stamp “yes” in a manner that has become signature for the Tinubu era legislature.
Prior to this sorry rubberstamp endorsement, national outcry against the declaration of the emergency had gone viral and widespread. Informed voices in Rivers State had cried out. So also had the leaders of the South South region, the Ijaw ethnic nationality and opposition political figures in the state. Governors of the South Southzone had unanimously opposed the president’s declaration and suspension of Fubara and his Deputy. Notable lawyers in the nation have either as individuals or associations punched legal holes on the process and substance of the emergency declaration. More significantly, key national opposition figures have since been screaming themselves hoarse on the illegality of the path taken by the president to arrive at this curious emergency declaration. Messrs Atiku Abubakar of the PDP, Peter Obi of the LP, Nasir El-Rufai of the SDP and a host of other smaller party voices have screamed out at the illegality and unconstitutionality of the entire process.
Ordinarily, a security deterioration in any part of the nation that could warrant a State of Emergency ought to be self evident. The danger to national security ought to be so self-evident that the public mood would in fact demand that the president declares an emergency.
None of that was evident in Rivers state in the last one week. But the president went ahead to make his curious declaration, giving the judgment of the Supreme Court or the democratic process no room to resolve the issues in question. Instead, the President assumed the role of grand arbiter by declaring governor Fubara on all counts. He accused the governor of willful damage to public property through the malicious demolition of the State House of Assembly. He equally accused the governor of precipitating the political crisis in the state and rebuffing earlier peace overtures towards a resolution.
In its totality, the presidential broadcast making the emergency declaration was anything but statesmanlike. It did not balance the blames between Fubara and his traducers. It hardly mentioned Mr. Wike who is clearly the architect of the entire Rivers crisis. In assuming that Wike is innocent, the president was taking on a partisan stance that vilified the PDP and exonerated his own APC. The trouble though is that his man Wike is neither PDP nor APC. He is a political bat that can only happen in the Nigerian political landscape.
Not in one instance did the president mention the nefarious role of his Minister of the FCT, Mr. Nyesom Wike, who has made the political destabilization of Rivers State an adjunct of his role as FCT Minister. It is road side knowledge that since he was appointed FCT Minister, Mr. Wike has spent more time fomenting political trouble in Rivers state than ensuring tolerable governance in the disorderly Federal Capital Territory which has recently become the crime headquarters of the nation.
On a political scale, the entire declaration of an unwarranted State of Emergency in Rivers State flies in the face of all sensible definitions of statesmanship or constitutional democracy. Its political undertone is implicit in Tinubu’sinclusions and exclusions in the text of the broadcast. The move increasing resonates with the President’s anxiety about his political future in 2027. It is common knowledge that in order to win a presidential election in Nigeria, a candidate needs to win the majority vote in a number of key population centres and states: Lagos, River/Port Harcourt, Kano and Abuja. In 2023, Tinubu nearly lost the presidential election because he was trounced in his Lagos home base, Abuja and Kano. He only ‘won’ in Rivers because Wike was on ground to allegedly manipulate the votes in hishome Obio Akpor Local Government area of Port Harcourt to deliver Rivers to Tinubu. This feat and fiat by Wike added to what sold Wike to Tinubu as a political contractor of immense value coupled with his use value as a permanent destabilizer of the opposition PDP and neutralizer of the AtikuAbubakar threat.
As things stand today, Wike remains Tinubu’smost valuable political asset outside his South West home base where his stronghold has narrowed to the Lagos and Ogun areas from where the majority of his political appointees have been drawn.
Beyond this nefarious investment in Wike as a dangerous geo political capital, Tinubu recognizes the strategic importance of the Niger Delta in the nation’s economics and politics. It is a zone of sleeping instability that can alter –for good or ill- the context of the nation’s economy and security architecture. The heavily armed miscreants in the Ijaw creeks can negate the billions of dollars annually budgeted on defence spending by the Nigerian state Those rough kids in dugout wooden boats can alter the calculations about the global energy outlook and even determine oil prices in far away Vienna. It is therefore quite possible that Mr. Tinubu may have erred on the side of political caution by this hasty declaration to avoid security embarrassment should the Rivers situation get out of hand.
Whatever may be his prompting on this disastrous State of Emergency declaration, Mr. Tinubu has walked into a political minefield of multiple bad possibilities. By failing to name Wike as a wrong egg in the pack, he has consecrated the man into a political Warrant Chief of sorts who can hardly be touched without grave harm coming to the political calculations of the president towards 2027. By single-handedly suspending or impeaching Fubara, Tinubu has made himself a partisan in the political fight in Rivers. And to the best of my knowledge, Rivers is a precarious place to declare your partisanship so early in a brewing political fight.
AS things now stand, it would be difficult to dissuade the common people of Rivers state from feeling a sense of victimhood. The Supreme Court had ruled against their entitlement to their constitutionally guaranteed federal revenue because of disagreements among politicians. Now the president has declared an emergency garrison rule over them thus placing them under an implicit military rule, thereby reducing further their freedoms and rights as Nigerian citizens. The ordinary Rivers person in Port Harcourt or Bonny is bound to ask: “What have we done to deserve this treatment?” Do the peoples of the South Southregion have a right to feel that Tinubu is treating them like a zone of conquered people? Such a feeling of alienation has political consequences which I am sure both Tinubu and his handlers fully understand.
Worse still, by taking unconstitutional steps to declare and sustain his State of Emergency, Tinubumay have walked in the direction of early steps towards unconstitutional and authoritarian rule. On that route, his highly informed opponents in the race for 2027 are waiting with a public that is already weaponized and angry against him for reasons of economic desperation and hardship. A largely unpopular president would be taking a big risk by taking actions that alienate even more significant populations.
Authoritarianism and unconstitutional moves cannot possibly enhance the re-election chances of an unpopular president surviving on a tenuous mandate.
