THE exit of former President Muhammandu Buhari – the ailing northern religious irredentist and blighted hermit, and the entrance of President Bola Amhed Tinubu – a medically impaired character, who is over burdened by drugs, certificate forgery and identity scandals, have jointly been dancing on our national grave; desecrating the meaning of democracy and the rule of law in the Nigerian State.
The similitude of ex-President Buhari’s exhibition of serious mental condition, of a type involving a breakdown in the relation between thought, emotion and behaviour; leading to faulty perception, inappropriate actions and feelings, withdrawal from reality and personal relationships, into fantasy and delusion, and a sense of mental fragmentation with Bola Tinubu, has been an albatross to national progress for nearly a decade. This nauseating situation is bound to continue if the Judiciary turn blind eyes to the election heist that threw up Tinubu in the first place.
Under the tragic reign of ex-President Muhammandu Buhari and the All Progressives Congress’ (APC) eight years of the locusts and economic paralysis, Nigeria was dragged through remarkable decay of beastiality; grounded at the rock of corruption, destruction of education and daily slaughtering of citizens in their homes, while the government averted its gaze as the people perished.
From the very beginnings of his presidency in 2015, Buhari was deceptively frank to himself and to the nation when he told the living truth that for old age and health impairments, he would have done better as Africa’s most populous president in human history. Buhari, as predicted unarguably, became the very worst president the nation has ever known. Bola Amhed Tinubu in his mental health deteriorating state – Nigeria would be forced to haggle through the same turtuous path, where Tinubu, who couldn’t build a standard hospital in Lagos State as the de facto Governor for 23 years, would be spending over one twelfth of his stolen presidency in foreign countries – seeking medical tourism.
The blame goes to Nigerians who allowed their votes to be manipulated and brazenly stolen and their rights trampled upon, yet pretended as if nothing has happened. Buhari/Tinubu/APC minders obviously gauged the mindsets of Nigeria in their long suffering and ever tolerance disposition of criminal government, without holding themselves out for liberating engagements, however terribly battered and no matter the circumscription of their human existence.
Come to think of it, what did Buhari promise Nigeria? Was any of his litany of promises made to Nigerians ever fulfilled? What did Tinubu promised apart from continuing from where Buhari has stopped? The point is where did Buhari start and where did he stopped? Buhari’s abhorrent presidency witnessed a relentless upsurge in human misery, rising national debt, two recessions, record unemployment and inflation levels, slaughtering of citizens by his Fulani terrorist brothers, while the nation’s national security architecture manned by men from his ethnic background were in open defence of the terrorists organization.
The global community knew that Buhari was defeated by oil thieves as the country lost N2.3 trillion to oil theft and pipeline vandalism in March 2023 alone. Nigeria was losing $700 million monthly to oil theft, the leadership of Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) claimed at some points. For eight years of his administration, Buhari and APC Government didn’t add a single megawatt to the 5,000 megawatts the way they met it in the power sector.
Therefore, it is safe to say that Buhari’s Presidency increased the nation’s poverty index in 8 straight years. The country overtook India in 2018 as the global capital of extreme poverty with 87 million of its population adjudged to be extremely poor. Some 91.6 million Nigerians currently live in extreme poverty, second behind India, per the World Poverty Clock. The National Bureau of Statistics in 2022 assessed 133 million citizens as living in multidimensional poverty and UNESCO gave a damning report of nearly 20 million out of school children, and 90 per cent of these numbers are from ex-President Buhari’s Northern Region.
For eight years, Buhari operated primitive economy policy hinged on borrowing without direction. As it has been reported earlier, the Debt Management Office put Nigeria’s debt at N12.12 trillion in June 2015, a debt-to-GDP ratio of 13.1 percent. It had climbed to N44.7 trillion by December 2022; ‘Ways and Means’ borrowing (mostly printing money) was N22.8 trillion. Accordingly, debt-to-GDP ratio has risen to 34.7 per cent. With the binge borrowing, servicing obligations wipe out revenue; 96 percent of revenue went for debt servicing in 2022, said the World Bank. At the moment, Nigeria total debt is well over N200 trillion Naira, all together, and by the current debt structure, it will take over a hundred years to pay back the debt.
At his departure hall, Buhari requested to borrow another $800 million dollars for fuel subsidy removal palliatives for 50 million poor Nigerians or 10 million households without showing empirical database of those classified as poor, and the method used to arrive at the figures, yet the spinless National Assembly had no qualms conceding to the fraudulent request.
Regrettably, Tinubu has bought into the blindfold of Buhari’s fuel subsidy removal palliatives hogwash. Now this: what would be the impact of $800m dollars which is exactly N400 billion naira, if you’re exchanging the dollars at a little above the official rate of N500 to a dollar in a nation of over 133 million multidimensional poor citizens? If you share N400 billion for 50 million individuals, each person will go home with N8,000 naira plus. Already, the nation is in convulsive mood since filling stations have hurriedly locked up in major cities.
Whereas, the government is pretending not to know the problem in the oil industry for obvious reasons. What would happen is that inflation will climb to as much as 40.08 per cent because fuel would be sold at N500 per litre at the minimum and the N8,000 the government is proposing for indigent citizens as palliatives will disappear in one singular instance, and subsidy regime would remain permanently. The government in its deceptive grandstanding says it would buy buses, build roads and bridges in each state of the country as if the government can no longer be alive to its contractual obligations to the citizens without fuel subsidy removal.
If Nigeria government is serious about subsidy removal, we would be saving about N7 trillion Naira that are being wasted on subsidy annually, yet Mele Kyari, the NNPC GMD said Nigeria looses nearly two billion naira monthly to oil theft, pipe lines vandals and a host of other official corruption under the table dealings. Nigeria can be making close to N200 trillion annually if the crude oil facilities are protected by the security agencies. We can then become a lending nation without being involved in copious endless borrowing.
For the record, Buhari became a General conquered by terrorists in his own state and across the country. Over 58,000 indigenes of Katsina State have escaped from his home state to Niger Republic, where he is also looking up to becoming a potential asylum seeker, ‘should Nigerians disturb him in Daura’, in his own words!
At Tinubu’s inauguration yesterday in Abuja, Nigerians and the world were treated to melodramatic epistle that became global embarrassing spectacle. While shielding a medical personality in hand gloves, his wife, Oluremi Tinubu, administered energy stabilizing substance into his right arm, yet he still couldn’t locate the rostrum on the podium – as he staggered repeatedly –even though he was practically lifted wholesale unto the stage.
Nigeria has truly played host to absolutely tragic and wicked rulers, in the persons of Buhari and Tinubu under APC administration. What a sordid experimentation with sadistic retrogression? Welcome to another reign of demented scoundrel!
Erasmus Ikhide can be reached via: ikhideluckyerasmus@gmail.com