Seeing things in north and south

Many years ago as an undergraduate, I got the first of many tastes of the depth of the Nigerian north south divide. The plans to move the Nigerian Law School to Abuja were in motion and my set, the 1997 graduates of law would be the first to be called in Abuja. My letter to the editor of the Guardian questioned the rational. I spoke for tradition, consistency and the prudent use of resources in defense of maintaining Lagos as the site of the venerable Nigerian Law School; some who read it saw that I spoke for the south as opposed to the north. The rest is history – the site was moved to Abuja, people say quality has fallen and billions have been spent on five sub-standard law schools (one geo political zone is being ‘cheated’) when we could have one glorious well funded Nigerian Law School.

Since then I have used my writing to try to understand, like other Nigerians, the utility of federal character in our constitution and I continue to attract comments relating to our suffocating mind set on maintaining the north south dichotomy. Now there is a word we throw around when we talk of maintaining a balance but ‘dichotomy’ also means ‘to divide into two mutually exclusive or contradictory groups or entities’. Seeing things in north and south is the direct root for the zoning formula being championed by the Peoples’ Democratic Party and to be fair – maybe any other party in power would use this ruse too.

Yes, this is yet another article on zoning because as we do what we do best (dinner table analysis and sitting down and looking) our politicians and wise men drum up the specter of war with fighting words.

Last week as Nigerians dealt with the pain of sacrificed innocents and the humiliation of very publicly staking our claim to selfishness and instability on the same day we capped a frenzy of meaningless celebration of 50 years of independence, the Northern Political Leaders Forum (NPLF) lead by Adamu Ciroma called for the resignation of President Goodluck. In a statement peppered with prayers, NPLF said they were not satisfied with how the President was handling the bomb blasts which they believed to be politically motivated. According to NPLF “he is desperate enough to want to hang mass murder around the neck of unnamed Northerners to achieve his second term”. They plan to ask the National Assembly to impeach him because “as Northerners and as citizens of this country, we no longer feel safe and secure under his leadership”.

Some of the arguments and sentiments expressed in the NPLF statement are understandable, but on so many levels they are misleading. There is no doubt that sentiments are frayed and we are worried about the stability of the country especially after the bombs and the missiles of counter accusations flying around.

However, it is hard to see how starting impeachment proceedings six months to the elections is the right thing to do for the country. Rightly so, it is not an easy task to impeach a president and Section 143 of the Constitution provides several steps and layers of obligations for the National Assembly and the Supreme Court to comply with. First, the allegation calling for impeachment must be signed by at least 156 Senators and Representatives. Then at least 312 out of our 469 legislators must agree to the allegation being investigated; then the Chief Justice will recommend a panel of 7 people of ‘unquestionable character’ (did I hear ‘good luck with that’) to investigate and write a report which must then be adopted by 312 legislators. And, the President has the right to defend himself at some stage. Is it likely that we can go through this process and still hold credible elections in April?

I think NPLF is making a mistake when it lays the blame of instability, grim political rivalry and quest for power solely on the President’s feet; all the PDP candidates, all of whom have been in power before are equally guilty. NPLF is culpable of taking advantage of the situation to whip up sentiments and make a bad situation worse by calling for the impeachment of the President. We do not need experienced political analysts to tell us that a handover could delay the electoral process and increase tensions across the country.

NPLF is right when it says the bombs were calculated to humiliate and to show the world that the Niger Delta militants have the ability “to influence political outcomes beyond their traditional area of influence”. But the question is, humiliate and influence whom? NPLF remind us of their warning to Nigerians to be vigilant about President Goodluck’s ‘desperate agenda to run’ and say they have been vindicated by the bombs. This means we can ask a few more questions: who benefits most from the chaos, fear and uncertainty being created and who loses more in the short and long term from the events of October 1? Maybe when we attempt to answer these questions, we can begin to analyze without the fog of sentiments.

True patriotism and leadership does not use the type of divisive rhetoric contained in NPLF’s statement nor the careless utterances coming from the Presidency, no matter how provoked both sides feel by the situation. We should be tired of being used by the political elite in strengthening the potency of this over 50 year old boogeyman of ethnic and religious marginalization and domination. It is a smokescreen to protect their real interests: themselves. There are probably members of the NPLF who have, in one capacity or another, served in every single government Nigeria has had since 1960 regardless of any ideological preferences for north, south, Muslim, Christian, dictatorship or democracy – so what exactly do they stand for and why do they want the rest of us to stand for north vs. south and Muslim vs. Christian?

There is no doubt that balancing the interests of perceived marginalization and ethnic and religious dominance is a delicate issue requiring extra creativity to manage especially since inexplicably, Nigerians seem to be more comfortable when ‘their own’ is representing them in government and PDP’s zoning formula was probably made, with the best of intentions, to manage this desire. But it is not working.

So no – impeachment is not the answer and we should all start writing to our legislators and telling them not to threaten the elections and waste our time and resources. I wish there was a provision of the Electoral Act to disqualify PDP from the presidential elections on the basis of overheating the polity and causing unrest. But there isn’t. There might be an out in Section 227 of the Constitution which might indirectly help us get rid of PDP – it says ‘No association shall retain, organise, train or equip any person or group of persons for the purpose of enabling them to be employed for the use or display of physical force or coercion in promoting any political objective or interest...” Isn’t PDP and the zoning formula guilty of this? That way the rest of the country can carry on and PDP can take the next four years to revise its constitution and come back to us when they have something better than ‘zoning’. Until then, we continue on our polarized march towards a firm north south dichotomy.