In November 1973, then U.S. President Richard Nixon made this improbable declaration at a meeting with newspaper editors: “People have got to know whether or not their President is a crook. Well, I’m not a crook.” It was early in the Watergate scandal and Nixon was responding to allegations that he had authorized the break-in into the Democratic Party’s national headquarters in the Watergate Hotel in Washington.
Fast forward to December 2018, and Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari just made an even more eye-popping denial: People have to know whether their president is dead and replaced by a lookalike. Well, I am not dead.
Okay, Buhari didn’t echo Nixon that closely, but he came quite close. “It’s real me, I assure you,” he said at a town hall meeting with Nigerians in Poland, where he was attending a conference.“I will soon celebrate my 76th birthday and I will still go strong.” In effect, Buhari was also reprising what American novelist and humorist Mark Twain said in 1897: “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.”
Regarding Nixon, the evidence ultimately proved that he was guilty as charged. And amidst an impeachment process, he resigned from office. Buhari, on the other hand, will be proven right. From all indications, he is alive — gaunt though he may be.
That the rumours of Buhari’s death gained enough traction to force him to deny them says much about Nigerian politics. The hunger for political power is so intense and the spoils so bountiful that many politicians would stop at nothing to attain them.
And then there is the reality of life in the age of Photoshop and social-media. Fictionalised productions and claims are increasingly difficult to distinguish from realities. It used to be that only the gullible are readily fooled by hoaxes. Now even people with above average capacity for discernment also fall for them. It takes a keen sense of scepticism to keep from being fooled.
A good beginning point is to heed the long-standing advice regarding sales pitches: If it seems too good to be true, it is. For tales from social media, if they seem too far-fetched to be true, they are probably a hoax. Even claims that are within the realm of possibility may be a hoax anyway.
To find the claim about Buhari credible, for example, one would have to believe quite a few improbables. First is that after about 29 years of marriage, Mrs. Aisha Buhari would go about her normal life — feigning normalcy and putting up a stoic face — just so she would remain a first lady. Also, that the feminist first lady—feminist for a Muslim woman—would hitch along with her husband’s lookalike. That would make her not just status-drunk, but also soulless.
The first lady isn’t that addicted to Aso Rock. After all, early in the administration, she stunned the nation by publicly warning her husband that she would not support his re-election bid in 2019 if he didn’t wrest policy control from aides she felt had hijacked it.
The first lady angle alone is enough to stamp “HOAX” on the dead and replaced rumour. Beyond that, there is the matter that a whole lot of other stakeholders would have to be complicit to sustain it. Think of the cabinet members, legislators, diplomats, fellow heads of state, business executives, civil society. It is a long list.
They would all subject themselves to the ghoulish experience of sitting across the table from or shaking hands with a fake president while the actual one — like John Brown’s body — lay smoldering in the grave.
And then there is Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, whose constitutional right it is to replace Buhari. Even for a person of much forbearance, it would be too much to bear to be supplanted by an impostor whose only claim to the presidency is that he looks like Buhari.
So, again, if it seems too far-fetched to be true, it is probably a hoax. And nothing can be more far-fetched that the idea of a president dying and being replaced with a lookalike.
Alas, seemingly credible claims are much tougher to discern. One red sign is “news” that is delivered by a robotic voice. And still another is “news” that lacks specific locales, such as the university where the supposed research finding was made or the hospital where victims of the hitherto unknown but horrific affliction were treated.
Alas, there is no foolproof guard against hoaxes. It is much like home security. Almost every home may be burglarized, but those without gates or locks are more much more susceptible to it.
Ultimate statesman departs
It has to be the ultimate in tragic irony that former US President George Bush the elder died at this time. The quintessential statesman and gentleman died at a time when the White House is characterized by scandals, turmoil and coarseness, everything that is the opposite of what Bush represented.
During his acceptance speech as the Republican party’s presidential candidate in 1988, Bush called for “a kinder, gentler nation”and “a thousand points of light.” It was his way of declaring commitment to the less privileged and urging others to do the same. And it was a decided departure from the trickle-down economic policy of the previous administration, for which he was vice president.
He followed through as president. Among other things, he saw to the passage of the Americans with Disability Act. The ADA mandated building designs that facilitated access by people in wheelchairs and required employers and educational institutions to do everything possible to enable the viability of people with disability.
Still, while running for re-election in 1992 against challenger Bill Clinton, Bush was derided as elitist and out of touch. That perception was cemented when, during a debate, he flubbed the answer to a trap question of what it cost to buy a loaf of bread. But though he didn’t know the cost, he did care about those who had none to eat.
Make no mistake, Bush was a conservative. Yet he never let the ideology override his humanism. His death has made violations of his blueprint on governance all the more glaring.
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