Nasir el-Rufai: The messenger and missing links

It is always interesting watching Nigerian politicians sing from the other side of the mouth when they lose out in the power game. In such moments, they momentarily shed their toga of arrogance and appear as patriots speaking for the people. Former governor of Kaduna State, Nasir el-Rufai, is currently in that state. Of late, he has been on the move, making comments and struggling to sell the impression of being concerned at the dangerous bend the country has been tilting to since the inauguration of the President Bola Tinubu administration. He has been quite unrelenting in his road shows and talk shows. But they are mere theatricals or, as expressed in street lingo, “all na wash.”

El-Rufai is clearly on a revenge mission, garbed in the quest for good governance. Since he was bloodied by other hawks around Tinubu and pushed out of the administration he helped foist on Nigerians, he is still dazed and has not overcome the shock. You would not blame him for the delirium. In the leadup to the 2023 election, he was visible and vocal in his support for Tinubu. Any person or group he suspected as an obstacle to the Tinubu presidency was brought down and trampled upon. He was that audacious that when the Central Bank, reading the lips of the then President Muhammadu Buhari, announced date for the old naira notes to cease as legal tender and Tinubu alleged that the directive was part of measures to stop him; El-Rufai made a broadcast ordering Kaduna residents to disregard the directive from the apex bank and continue using the currencies.

He did not spare Tinubu’s opponents. At a point, he dismissed the Labour Party (LP) candidate, Peter Obi, as a Nollywood actor, who lacked the capacity to win elections. Christians, of course, did not matter in his calculation. In a forum with Muslim clerics in Kaduna, he made a show of how he and his group facilitated the emergence of Tinubu as All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, majorly because he was a Muslim and how they insisted that Tinubu must pick a Muslim running mate. “Asiwaju (Tinubu) got the ticket. And when he got it, we knew he would have no option but to pick a Muslim as his vice; if not, he would lose the election. Just as I said, politics is all about calculation, there is no room for maneuver,” he boasted.

Tinubu was, of course, declared the winner by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and El-Rufai pranced about, looking forward to being handsomely rewarded. He was initially rumoured to be the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF). But that did not happen. To worsen matters, when he appeared before the Senate for ministerial screening, a letter alleging that he was under investigation by security agencies surfaced and effectively put his appointment on hold. That marked the beginning of his unease.

The former governor has been trying to play the good boy and be on the side of the masses ever since. The other day, he was spotted in Abuja with Obi, 2023 presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, and others proffering measures for strengthening democracy in Nigeria. The same Obi that he wrote off as a paperweight! The same Atiku he has severally run down as a spent force!

He has on other occasions spoken against the absence of internal democracy in APC. If you then mistake these remarks for altruism, you will end up falling for his dummy. The entire thing is a facade. Beneath the farcical posturing is his trademark arrogance and assumption of prime importance in determining who gets what in the country. Such was the case in his recent outing in which he directed a veiled threat to Tinubu to play ball with the North or forget re-election in 2027.

“Love or loathe that fact, the North remains the kingmaker in Nigerian politics, at least, as of today. Any politician or political party that plays with that reality might pay a steep political price for it,” he boasted.

That is El-Rufai in his elements, a man of brief size with Olympian impression of self. He enjoys the klieg lights. Controversy seems a second name for him. He courts it and revels in it, even at the cost of public good. He is never tired of playing games with important issues. To him, everything is politics and politics is everything.

Recall that as a governor he had, in flagrant disregard to the complex cultural and religious sensitivities of Kaduna, appointed a fellow Muslim, Hadiza Sabuwa Balarabe, as deputy and carried on as if it did not matter. He even encouraged his successor and protégé, Senator Uba Sani, to follow the odious step.

Recall also when he threatened international election observers that they would be evacuated in body bags, if they ventured into the country to monitor the 2019 presidential election. Recall, again, when he claimed being asked to offer bribes by senators during his screening for ministerial appointment during the Olusegun Obasanjo presidency but, when pressed to provide evidence on his claims, he chickened out, saying God was his witness.

Once on this space, I had noted that the former governor acts the good boy when it suits his agenda and hits hard when he has an interest to pursue. He has not deviated from that path. For him, scruples are matters of convenience to be observed when necessary but can be discarded, if need be. He is shrewd. And cold!

So, while he alleges rumours of his imminent arrest and torture in one of the offices of the National Security Adviser (NSA), the alert needs to be thoroughly interrogated. He could be right or wrong. To be sure, it would be a dangerous gamble to take away anything from the Tinubu administration, given the increasing desperation by its foot soldiers to silence any perceived voice of opposition to its lackluster leadership.

El-Rufai is a classic case of nemesis running full cycle, no doubts. Some enthuse that he is reaping from the odious seeds he had sowed at various times. One thing is however clear; he deserves the rights to air his views and the freedom to associate with who he chooses. The law permits him those rights as other citizens. But while he points out the obvious failings of the government, there is need to situate the messenger and of course, the missing links.