Atiku: Between Morality And Politics

Politics is not that dirty, is it? Just like there are some ‘truths’ in the advertisement, so is morality in politics and despite the great works of Machiavelli and Kissinger a large dose of morality is needed in politics and I thought vice president Atiku Abubakar needs this dose.

On Wednesday, 5th April 2006 vice president Atiku Abubakar went ballistic, firing on everybody, unknown to him including himself. It was a meeting of FORUM 2007 which had an attendance of more than 150 members of the National assembly, 4 states governors and other prominent Nigerians. In a speech that could accurately be described as ‘lyrics of indiscretion,’ vice president Atiku Abubakar confirmed to Nigerians that morality is absent in Nigeria’s politics. It was the right thing at the wrong time by the wrong person.

Let me clear something here, I am not in support of anything anti-people like the diabolic third term. I will rather kiss a toad than to have a romance with third term; however, the vice president has no moral standing to oppose it or tell Nigerians all is not well, because when all was well, he never remembered us.

The vice president said nothing about the common man in his Wednesday speech (nothing for us if he gets there) nor the economy then what is he saying. Instead, his worry is only on politics, especially in the PDP. What is our business with the party that is yet to deliver? Atiku argued PDP has been hijacked. ‘I raised an alarm that PDP was about to be hijacked’ he said. Somebody forgot to ask the vice president ‘hijacked from whom?’ certainly from Atiku and not Nigerians. So if it is hijacked what is our business? Atiku would have stolen the show and the hearts of Nigerians if he addressed how Nigerians are finding it difficult to eat 3 times a day.

What does our vice president know about democracy or elections? Here was a man who forced candidates on people; at least the people of Gombe can tell how Goje was forced on them, or the Adamawa state gubernatorial election tribunal, in which Atiku went wild saying this is ‘rashin mutunci’ ( lack of respect) where is the rule of law? Because your political son is told he did not win an election you say ‘Rashin mutunci’?   Thus Atiku has no moral ground to defend a democracy he had murdered in 2003. You can not put something on anything and expect it to stand. You can not defend a dead democracy.

If the VP was a little careful he would have had it smooth to the most exalted post of responsibility, but he missed every opportunity given to him. As chairman of the privatisation council now Bureau for Public Enterprise (BPE) privatisation became ‘Atikunisation’ and till date nothing had been remitted to the government treasury as revenue from privatisation from 1999-2003 when Atiku was really in charge.

The VP miss used every opportunity he got with the media, on many occasions he abused the common man, and in one such case in an interview with the BBC he said God is not with the common man. The same Atiku was the vice president that allowed his security to beat up a photojournalist, Akintunde Akinyele during the coronation of the Oba of Lagos on August 30th 2003, not for all these cases the media would have been of help to him today.

To be fair to the vice president he was a loyal VP but loyalty must be consistent. Why the rebellion now? I do not want to think it is all about, ‘I want to be president too’ Atiku should know that to succeed you need to be loyal. To succeed never you outshine your master, this the VP did. He overlooks law 1 of 48 laws of power. If ‘you have read the 48 laws of power you will agree with me, the vice president was wrong. Law 3 which is ‘conceal your intentions’, is what the VP never did. Everybody including my 3-year-old son knew the VP is running for president. As a law, you are suppose to put people in he dark by not revealing the purpose of your actions.

Can somebody read law 5 to the VP? ‘So much depend on reputation-guard it with your life’ Reputation is the cornerstone of power but the VP has forgotten reputation the very day he became VP. He is part of every shady deal in these 7 years of civilian government called Democracy

The time has come that the Obasanjo/Atiku government started preparing to leave for 2007 is just nearby. They have failed us and we can easily forgive them if they vacate Aso rock by 2007. Good luck Nigeria.