2027: Ganduje’s vacuous ‘No vacancy in Aso Rock’

It troubles the mind that Nigerian politics, especially in the present democratic dispensation is crowded with gut-wrenching infuriating leaders. Inspiring leaders are in short supply. That’s why after many years, what democracy has offered to other countries has continued to elude Nigeria. It’s the near-absence of inspiring leaders. According to Harvard Business Review, ‘inspired leaders’ are exemplars of desired behaviour’. They offer a big picture of value-based, optimistic vision of the future that propels people toward collective goal. Inspiring leaders empower, elevate, and empathize. They are not eye-pleasers. By contrast, ‘infuriating leaders’ are small-minded, valueless pessimists.                             

Every comment by an infuriating leader tends to diminish the value we cherish. Infuriating leaders prioritise personal power and selfish gains over development and well-being of the people. It’s not unkind to say that Abdullahi Ganduje, National Chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress(APC) falls in the category of infuriating leaders. His recent, dangerous and damaging comment that ‘there’s no vacancy in Aso Rock’, come 2027, is vacuous and anti-democratic.    Though not really surprising, Nigerians are used to such asinine comments that diminish the power of the ballot box in choosing a leader based on competency, capacity, integrity, and respect for the rule of law.                                         

Half-way into President Bola Tinubu’s first term in office, Ganduje is telling all presidential aspirants, including voters, that Tinubu’s re-election is a fait accompli. He has told everyone, including presidential aspirants from the North that the race  for the presidency in 2027 has been decided already started long before the flag off of campaigns. It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that about 2 years to 2027 presidential election, the desperate pursuit to re-elect President Bola Tinubu has been at fever pitch for months now. Nobody is asking the question: Are you better or worse now than when Tinubu was sworn in two years ago?  That’s why Nigerian politics rings alarm. Ganduje’s ‘no vacancy in Aso Rock’ is  about the manner of characters that pollute our democratic process and makes it look like a sham, if not a scam. Men like Ganduje are pseudo democrats.         

This column raised this alarm last December, when a team of APC pseudo democrats said every door for opposition parties has been closed for the 2027 presidency. For want of proper definition, these politicians are tricksters who deceive for personal gains. They are flatterers and ass-kissers. It’s the currency of their fame. They are sending messages to the President that they are working so hard to keep him in power. That’s why our democracy heaves with hysteria. There’s no doubt that Tinubu loves what he’s hearing from Ganduje. That’s why he has surrounded himself with ‘yes men’. 

He uses them to gauge public opinions. It’s also part of his tool to intimidate political opponents. As I argued months back in this column, men like Ganduje have a clear-cut pattern. Their  flattering often comes ahead of the next election. But unknown to many of them, after consolidating his grip on power, the President will likely discard  them  like disposable napkins because their relevance to him has expired.  That’s why our politics is a fun to follow. No lesson learned to guide future behaviour and utterances.  This is what I mean. In 2002, a year before the 2003 presidential election, Chief Tony Anenih(now of blessed memory) fondly called “Mr Fix it” because of his wiles and schemes to manipulate the political process, declared defiantly, “there No vacancy in Aso Rock”.                           He said nothing would stop the then President, Olusegun Obasanjo from being re-elected for a second term in 2003. At a dinner with some editors late in 2002 at his residence in Asokoro, (I was Editor, Sunday Champion then), I remember asking him what he meant by “No vacancy in Aso Rock”, he said, the ‘incumbent is in the ring and nobody can dislodge him”. For me, that comment signaled the ‘do-or-die’ politics that has become the hallmark of the present Nigerian politics, where politicians see politics as war, rather than an electoral contest to choose the best to govern the country.                                                      That’s why Nigeria is not making progress, because the worst become the “best” material for the most political job in the land. Again, on December 6, 2010, few months to 2011 presidential election, same Anenih told  leaders of South South PDP in Benin city, Edo state during the inauguration of Jonathan/Sambo campaign Organisation that ‘No vacancy exists in the presidency’. He described Jonathan presidential ambition as “Nigeria’s project”. Anenih also claimed that Jonathan  “possessed all the qualities” that would enable him overrun any candidate, both in the PDP primary and at  the presidential election.        Concluding his speech that blustery afternoon, Anenih wowed the crowd, saying, “mark what I said today, I don’t waste my words, we have sent a signal to those inside and outside”. But, before his death, Anenih’s relationship with Obasanjo who ‘used’ him to great effect, strained irreparably. That’s the infamous road Ganduje is walking now. Like a parent trying to reason like a child, he told party supporters in Kano last week that aspirants who are nursing presidential ambition in 2027, especially from the Northern part of the country should shelve their ambition until 2031 because, “there is no vacancy in Aso Rock”. Same warning was made few months ago by George Akume, Secretary to the Government of the Federation.      For politicians like Ganduje,  Akume, and others, treating people to the ballot box on Election Day is a mere waste of time. They believe, albeit wrongly, in the myth that the incumbent President must always be re-elected at all cost, no matter how unpopular he is, or how he has run the country aground through bad policies. For them,  elections do not offer valid choices. But this myth had been demystified several times in many democracies and in Nigeria in 2015, when Goodluck Jonathan as incumbent president lost to Muhammadu Buhari  ‘against the run of play’.                         

Midway into Tinubu presidency, this much is clear: No incumbent President has made such a huge, unpardonable  errors in almost every sector of our economy and livelihood as his administration has done. The worst may be ahead. In the past 20 months of his presidency, there’s no conscious effort to develop a coherent policy strategy that will steer the country in the right direction. We all hit Buhari as an unapologetic, nepotistic president. But in comparison, Tinubu has already surpassed Buhari’s missteps.             

Truth is, anyone who believes that anything good will come from the present government must be living in utopian world. Therefore, contrary to Ganduje’s twisted logic,  there is vacancy in Aso Rock in 2027. This is because Nigeria and Nigerians have experienced their worst moments in decades. Never before have Nigerians been visited with such hard – damn hard – tough times as they are experiencing today. I have this feeling that when you hear, ‘No vacancy in Aso Villa’, the president’s henchmen are expressing a ‘fear factor’. They won’t tell you that. The fear is  based on the president’s abysmal performance, and low approval rating in public standing. This is the fact: Tinubu is beatable in 2027 if the presidential election is not stolen. If you are not aware, APC is playing the expectation game. One of its offensive political weapons is to decimate the opposition and cause mass defections of opposition lawmakers. For now, that strategy is working.