A tale of irresistible yam and an unrelenting goat

Aliyu Musa

Yam is a pleasantly inviting grub and goat is an exceptionally stubborn animal whose bid to take a bite is seemingly unstoppable. And regardless of every frustration he comes back charging at the yam with a fixed intent: to devour it. So, to break the cycle the yam must be kept out of sight and out of reach or the goat must be perpetually restrained.

In a media chat in February, President Goodluck Jonathan made a futile attempt to give a positive meaning to a statement previously attributed to him that stealing is not corruption, which has left not a few ruffled, particularly given his government’s zero tolerance for fighting corruption. Applying the yam and goat analogy he argued that unless incentives for stealing were kept out of the reach of people, Nigerians, stealing was inevitable. Further attempts to differentiate theft from corruption were as ineffective as the yam and goat story.

But the lesson I took away from the president’s point and the debate it generated afterwards is that unless effectively restrained power, being an intoxicant with enormous influence, cannot be swept off the feet of an incumbent regime. The message is brought home with every new plot by the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to overstretch its stay, even if it means playing outside of the rule.

Long before the conspiracy by NSA Sambo Dasuki and security chiefs that forced INEC chairman Attahiru Jega to postpone the February election by six weeks, it was common knowledge that the ruling party was already canvassing for support to extra-constitutionally elongate its hold on power. Then it seemed impracticable. But when fully hatched, using blackmail as a weapon, Jega simply succumbed, allowing the goat to inch closer to a bite.

In the days that followed the postponement more happenings have confirmed the ruling party’s obsession with power, which the president recently said he’d never let slip off his hand. And to actualize the party and president’s dream Professor Jega, who in spite of his past imperfections has now proven to be uncompromising, has become a target. News of his looming sack began with whispers but grew louder and became a major news item and has since then refused to evaporate into the oblivion, despite repeated reassurance from the president.

Jega’s number one sin is his refusal to let the goat have the yam by using a ‘senseless’ technology that he calls PVC (permanent voters’ cards) as a curb. More so, the PVC has add-on checks, which make it even more difficult for the goat to access the yam, which badly irritates the president and his men and for which they have repetitively convinced themselves that the only way out is to show Jega the way out and let hell loose.

Jega’s ouster is not one that would come easily; it wont come without a big fight, not from the INEC chairman but from the millions of Nigerians who see it as a climax of the plot to allow the president and his cronies rig their way back to power or make sure the election does not hold so they can keep power and its juicy accessories. But their biggest mistake is that they have overestimated their capability and wrongly read the mood of the country. Come what may, on March 28, 2015 Nigerians want to decide who leads them for another four years.

So, Mr President you are right about keeping the yam away from a stubborn goat that would not mind sticking out its neck. But you are wrong about the possibility of accessing the yam through the backdoor because, with your permission, the process has evolved through a long tunnel that is now beyond your control. If I were you I would let ‘nature’ take its course and accept the outcome.

Buhari brain dead

Mrs Patience Jonathan, the president’s wife, aptly fits Professor Wole Soyinka’s description of a domestic appendage, but she also doubtlessly doubles as an extreme liability to the president’s already diminished popularity. She is a major factor to the split in the ruling party that led to Rivers State governor, Rotimi Amaechi’s defection to the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC), which is immensely hurting the president’s reelection bid. She has also been fingered in other crises in the ruling party, which would definitely cost the party vital votes even in President Jonathan’s state, Bayelsa.

Lately she has taken to direct mudslinging, complementing the trio of Doyin Okupe, Femi Fani-Kayode and Ayo Fayose’s effort towards making their candidate more unpopular. Among her many sacrileges are a call on PDP’s supporter’s in her state to throw stones at anyone that says ‘change’ and a reference to opposition candidate General Muhammadu Buhari as an old man whose brain is dead. Ordinarily one would not waste time acknowledging thoughtless comments from a woman that does not know what is befitting of her position as the wife of the president of a country. But it is important to draw attention to this hate campaign, so the world would know who to hold responsible if the situation, as much as we hope it doesn’t, eventually degenerates.