Banire, Aregbesola and Osun polls

 

                    His diminutive physique masks a razor- sharp intellect and wit. Dr Muiz Banire, lawyer, commissioner first of transportation and then the environment for 12 years under the Tinubu and Fashola administrations and now National Legal Adviser to the APC, was the guest speaker at a colloquium in Lagos in honour of Ogbeni Raufu Aregbesola.

The colloquium was obviously spurred by Aregbesola’s outstanding re-election for a second term in the bitterly contested August 9th governorship election in Osun state.

There is much to agree with in Banire’s presentation on the occasion titled ‘Osun’s Election: A Pathway to Nigeria’s Democratic Growth’. For example, he paints a vivid and harrowing picture of the security siege on Osun before and during the election. He exposes the many behind the scene bids to manipulate the poll and rig the elections and how these were thwarted through vigilance and proactive action. Among the more sensible of Banire’s recommendation is his admonition that a political party should always monitor closely officials elected in its platform. This is in order to ensure adherence to the party’s manifesto as well as prevent the alienation of the government and the party from the people due to unpopular policies.

However, Banire treads treacherous and slippery analytic terrain when he makes a distinction between a party and the candidate seeking election on its platform. He contends that it was Aregbesola that won the election in Osun and not the All Progressives Congress (APC). The APC, according to Banire, has become unpopular because of imposition of candidates such that the people may have voted for the opposition but for Aregbesola’s charisma, grassroots appeal and superlative performance.

Let us admit without conceding that Banire is right. What would be the incentive for the average voter or APC supporter to vote for the PDP, for instance, when its own candidate for the Osun election emerged through a violence-infested process where a former governor of Osun was savagely manhandled by a serving Minister all because he aspired to fly the party’s flag in the election!

Again, could it be that most of those Banire claimed to have visited on door-to-door campaigns and who reportedly expressed disenchantment with the APC, sought elective or appointive positions and were unjustly denied the opportunity? That would be strange. I would wager that in most polities, those who actively seek elective office constitute less than one per cent of the population. Osun certainly cannot be an exception.

In the first republic, Chief Obafemi  Awolowo’s Action Group (AG) was the cynosure of all eyes due to its spectacular developmental achievements in the South-West. Even though he was enormously gifted as a leader, thinker and astute manager of men and resources, Awolowo never sought to personally appropriate the party’s collective success to himself. It was the same case in the second republic when Alhaji Jakande was easily the most distinguished governor. Again, he never claimed or sought personal glory. He knew that in a progressive party, both successes and failures must be collectively borne.

I am sure that Banire’s thoughts at the colloquium are his and do not necessarily represent the views of Aregbesola. For, being a product of collective struggle himself right from his student days, I think that Aregbesola is too philosophically deep, intellectually sound, historically conscious, and organisationally disciplined to identify with the kind of hubris espoused by Banire.

It is pertinent to ask, ‘Why was Aregbesola able to seek re-election for a second term?’ It is because he had won election for a first term and performed creditably. Why was he able to contest for the first term? It was because he was fielded by the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) as its governorship candidate. Here is where I think Banire misses the critical point. The relationship between a party and a candidate is a dialectical one. The party can offer a candidate its platform but it cannot do the candidate’s job for him/her.

If we apply Banire’s logic to Ekiti, then we can surmise that the outcome of the polls there was a vote against Fayemi and not the APC. That would be nothing but sterile intellectual masturbation. Even if it were so, the reality is that both Fayemi and the APC in Ekiti are out of power – at least for now. The APC must gnash its teeth and bemoan the calamity that befell it in the August 9th election. The grief is not that of Fayemi alone. In the same way, the APC is entitled to rejoice at the triumph of the party in Osun while basking with Aregbesola in the euphoria of victory.

If the candidate performs exemplarily, the success belongs both to him and the platform that gave him the opportunity to develop and exhibit his leadership skills. On the other hand, if an elected official performs poorly and is defeated at the polls, both the party and the candidate bear the consequences.

Let us take governor Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN) as an example. By 2007, he came to power relying solely on the machinery and structure of the party as he did not have any structure at the time. By 2011, however, his impressive performance had turned him into a formidable brand. The party gave him an opportunity to run for governor on its platform. He grabbed the opportunity and through industry, competence and vision, endeared himself and his party to the electorate. At the end of the day, both the party and the governor enjoy a mutually beneficial and reinforcing relationship.

Banire rightly stressed the need for internal democracy within parties to allow the best and most popular candidates emerge in free and fair intra-party processes. He argues that imposition of candidates is one of the greatest banes of the APC. Well, it is difficult for one to scientifically determine the meaning of imposition in a situation in which, for instance, over 20 aspirants are gunning for a given position and each believes that if he does not win, it is because the winning candidate has been imposed on the party!

The eminent political scientist, Professor Richard Sklar, is quoted by Banire as describing the defunct AG of the first republic as “the best organised, the best financed and the most efficiently run party in Nigeria”. But nothing in this quote suggests that the AG was a model of internal democracy. In fact, I think Banire should read Sklar more extensively. I would recommend in particular his collection of essays titled ‘African politics in Post-Imperial Times’. He has at least two chapters in this book, which offer a rigorous discourse of the contradictions of Nigeria’s political system as well as the travails of Obafemi Awolowo in Nigerian politics.

When Awolowo, following the failure of his party in the 1959 parliamentary election, went to the centre as Leader of Opposition, he tried to re-fashion the party as a vote harvesting machine capable of winning elections outside the South West. To do that he had to retain a firm grip both on the party as well as the machinery of government in the western region even as he sought ethnic minorities in the North and the East to ally with the AG. This led to a head on collision with Chief SLA Akintola, who had succeeded him in office as Premier of the region. His espousal of the new ideology of democratic socialism further alienated Awolowo from the business interests that formed a formidable pillar of support for the AG as well as many of the elders and traditional rulers who flocked to Akintola’s side. Awolowo’s attempt to have his way against all odds was partly responsible for the crack within the AG that ignited a chain of events that led to the collapse of Nigeria’s democracy in the first republic.

No matter what anybody may think about Tinubu and Fashola, they have managed their relationship with maturity and mutual respect such that we have not witnessed in Lagos, the kind of intra-party implosion that destroyed the Action Group in the first republic and nearly brought the entire country to ruin or the godfather versus godson skirmishes prevalent in different parts of the country in this dispensation.

A third critical issue raised by Banire in his lecture is that of the place of zoning and religion in the country’s politics particularly Lagos State. He is opposed to any form of zoning or concession of positions to accommodate divergent interests in the political process. He declares: “For God’s sake, Lagosians are only interested in good and qualitative governance and no-one cares whether you are a Christian or Muslim”. To put it mildly, this is simplistic and overly idealistic.

I recommend Professor Arendt Lijphart’s ‘Democracy in Plural Societies’ for Dr Banire’s perusal. Lijphart examines the various strategies, including institutional strictures and processes put in place in ethno-culturally plural societies like Nigeria to achieve political inclusiveness and promote political stability and national cohesiveness. Yes, merit must never be sacrificed on the altar of zoning. But the truth is that there are capable and competent candidates for public office cutting across all nooks and crannies of the country? Would Banire, for instance, want the federal character provision, which is a deliberate balancing device in the 1999 constitution abrogated?