‘My Transition Hour’ by GEJ is all that is needed now for Nigeria, for Nigerians, for PDP, for APC, for the third force (RIP), for the angry twittering young people, for 2019, for Atiku (runaway visitor-in-chief to the USA), for Obi, for Buhari, for Osinbajo (money sharer-in-chief). We are all still trapped in GEJ’s transition mood, in motion, in anger of what was supped to be, what was and what is to come.
GEJ has claimed that Jega conspired to rig him out. Yes Jega refused to drive equal distribution of PVCs between North and South. Jega ensured that the war-ravaged North had higher PVC collection stats than the peaceful South. Jega actually went on the streets to drive this unequal distribution. It was indeed part of Jega’s strategic objective as implied by GEJ in his Transition Hour.
In his quest to totally finish GEJ, Jega introduced Card Reader that somewhat prevented some level of electoral fraud. The Card Reader in part, did not allow for full scale electoral fraud. Yes, this was designed to frustrate GEJ’s ambition as PDP had relied heavily on conventional voting process laced with ballot stuffing, snatching, intimidation and fraudulent vote count. But Jega counter rigged GEJ with the Card Reader. A classic example was the Card Reader deployed to Otuoke. Jega made sure that the machine rejected the Jonathans, albeit they were allowed to vote afterwards.
Elder Godswill Orubebe tried to pull a come-back, but Jega mounted a brick-wall. Jega knows his onions, especially on how to build walls. Trump needs a master class from him.
As alluded to in GEJ’s Transition Hour, Barack Obama did a state of the nation broadcast to Nigerians and asked them not to vote for GEJ. It was part of the counter-rigging strategy by the international community. In fact, Obama deliberately withdrew support to GEJ to fight insurgency which the opposition used to campaign against him. Some governors in GEJ’s PDP worked against his ambition, while some governors defected to fight him from the other side.
It was all plotted in favour of the opposition. INEC, Jega, politicians, Nigerians, international community, all conspired against GEJ who did everything right to be re-elected. The Transition Hour found all of us guilty. The large scale of corruption under GEJ, widespread insecurity, artificial economic growth, depleted vault, deteriorating quality of life, lack of social and infrastructural investment could ordinarily have gotten GEJ re-elected but foolish us, we were deceived to do otherwise. And finally, Transition Hour has judged us all.
If GEJ had won 2015 election, he would have fought corruption to a standstill. Cut GEJ some slack. He demonstrated political will to remove Sanusi Lamido Sanusi from CBN when the now Emir was running his mouth like a whistle blower. He would have deployed the same political will to operationalise TSA, BVN, IPPS because he was the one that started them. Versus whistle blower policy abused by Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, GEJ would have deployed trumpet blower policy which would be louder. He would have yielded to NASS on getting a stronger EFCC chair rather than allowing Magu to perpetuate himself in acting capacity. He would have recovered more loots and put it in the care of Sambo Dasuki. He would have oiled NASS relationship with some gives to allow budget passage on time. The country would have moved faster, forward into yesterday. We missed GEJ!
Not done yet on his anti-corruption crusade, GEJ would have added more responsibilities to Deziani Madueke’s portfolio to keep churning out billionaires in their numbers and cloaked oil subsidy in a different nomenclature. GEJ would have become an anti-corruption hero. He would not just be AU poster boy on anti-corruption, he would have been nominated by the UN as the face of anti-corruption leadership, with his portrait displayed in the open beside the UNGA hashtag at the UN HQ.
On the economy, GEJ would have prevented recession by mopping up all the loots (in dollars) that his cronies kept in trust. He would have allowed market forces to determine our FX. He would have diversified the economy and find alternatives to our revenue sources. He would have gotten refineries working again at maximum capacity and up daily throughput. He would have even prevented crash in oil price through his exemplary diplomatic exploits. Don’t forget that GEJ got Nigeria into the UN security council twice. So as a poster boy for the UN, he would have stabilized oil price above 100 dollars per barrel through diplomacy in OPEC.
As attested to by Chidoka Osita, a former Aviation Minister, GEJ had a long list of projects already conceptualized, initiated, signed, awarded. GEJ was just waiting for his re-election to complete all the projects within two years without borrowing a dime. Lagos-Ibadan road, East-West road, second Niger bridge, all would have been commissioned by now. He would not have even needed to make noise about rail lines as we would have gotten use to infrastructural development without the traditional media hype. All our airports would have become world class and top rated.
More importantly, Boko Haram would not just have been technically defeated, it would have been completely neutralized with heavy investment in ammunitions and security votes. The sect would not have even had the breathing space to factionalize as Abubakar Shekau would have been captured, rehabilitated, re-integrated and he would have been running an NGO on peace-building by now. Herdsmen and farmers would have formed business relationships and nurture peaceful co-existence. With the empowerment of OPC in Lagos in the build up to the 2015 elections, GEJ would have created a Ministry to cater for OPC and IPOB, just like Niger Delta, to settle the boys and keep them busy till the next election cycle. Mazi Nnamdi Kanu would have been made the permanent secretary of the Ministry reporting directly to the presidency.
Nigeria, through GEJ, would have started permanent residency programme for foreigners who wish to relocate to the country and get Nigerian citizenship.
In the end, what would forever remain in our memory would be that Sir GEJ wrote a book and issued a disclaimer on some parts of the contents while anchoring it on piracy. He may already be preparing a rejoinder to his own book. With GEJ, we would have been a nation on the rise, into oblivion. May God continue to save us from cluelessness!
Obajeun Jonah Ayodele writes from Lagos. He is on twitter via @Obajeun
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