This is a long speech but it seem to worth the time because it touched on some political issues in Nigeria.


Text of Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) National Leader,
Asiwaju Bola Tinubu’s speech at the Woodrow Wilson Center, Washington, DC. on August 22.
I am honored to be here today at the Woodrow
Wilson Centre and thank you for
inviting me. I commend the work that you do. This is an
institution known for scholarship, lively discourse and the
search for policies that advance peace and development. By
shining the light of knowledge, you help dispel ignorance and explore solutions to conflicts. Therefore, I will do my humble best to speak in the spirit that is the hallmark of this venerable institution.
•Nigeria is the focus of our conversation today and I will
attempt to briefly capture the challenges that confront us as a nation. I have devoted most of my adult life to promoting
democracy in Nigeria. The battle has been neither short nor
easy. I have lived in exile, unsure if I would ever see my
homeland again. My life has been under threat to the point
where I did not know if I would see the next sunrise. I say
these things not to boast. There are thousands who made
similar or greater sacrifice. I say these things so you may
understand that my address to you is based on the long-term
perspective of a person who has occupied the trenches from
the onset of the struggle for democracy versus dictatorship in
Nigeria. I am not of that class of politicians who have
benefitted from the struggle without participating in it.
Because they never invested themselves in this clash between
liberty and blind might, these politicians do not fully
appreciate, nor do they seek to advance the cause of
democracy. Because my life has been defined by the
achievements and setbacks recorded in this struggle, I
understand with every sinew and fiber of my being how far
we have come and how far we have yet to go.
Background: The House has not fallen but its structure is
weak
Nigeria currently is tossed by four distinct but related storms.
First, we exist in political limbo. Although uniformed generals
no longer formally control the levers of government, the ways
and manner of military rule still dominate the political
landscape. We hold elections in Nigeria. But that isolated fact
does not a democracy make.
•Nigeria exists in that strange dimension where we have a
civilian government equally possessed of the attributes of
authoritarian rule as if democratic governance. Everyday
Nigeria awakens, it awakens to this hybrid existence and a
vexing question: To which side shall the balance tip?
Although most of us consider this an unfortunate predicament,
numerous actors profit from the current state of affairs.
Leading figures in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have
repeatedly proclaimed the objective of ruling Nigeria for an
uninterrupted sixty- year period. Such dynastic aspirations are
at variance with true democracy.
•Then there are those of us who believe the veneer of
democracy is insufficient in this day and age. We believe
Nigeria cannot remain a confused hybrid without succumbing
to national regression. The nation must move either toward
real democracy or real disaster. People are fond of saying that
Nigeria is at the crossroads. Our situation is more complex
than what the phrase usually implies. We are like a person
with multiple personalities standing at the crossroads.
Consequently, we remain locked in a struggle simultaneously
pulling Nigeria in different directions. Democratic and
authoritarian forces engage in a tug-of-war in which the soul
of Nigeria’s governance is the prize at stake.
•Due to the fact that competing elements of the political class
have been locked for the last 13 years in this struggle to
define the nature of government, there has been insufficient
governance for the benefit of the people. We certainly have
not seen much good governance. To be honest, we have not
even had much in the way of purposeful democratic
governance. Unfortunately, we have suffered more from
inertia and confusion than from rule of intelligent but
malevolent design.
•Second, mostly due to Boko Haram and criminal groups in
the northern and eastern parts of the country, internal security
has ebbed to a low point. This has led to fear and uncertainty.
Tension now dominates religious and political activities. It has
had a profound chilling effect on economic activity in many
areas. In many places, for example, children no longer go to
school and farmers neglect their fields, fearing attacks by
Bolo Haram.
•Third, ethnic and sectional divisions are presently higher in
Nigeria than at any time in recent memory. The ruling party
resides in a state of chronic indigestion regarding the ethnic
and regional allocation of top offices in the party and
government, especially that of the president. Although
members of the same “ruling” party, political figures from the
north and south hurl often reckless accusations at each other
not because of differences over substantive issues but because
of regional loyalties. They don’t differ over substantive issues
because they rarely think about such matters. No, they bicker
across the widening geographic and ethnic divide that they
have helped to create. Those who should aspire to the status
of statesmen lunge at one another like street brawlers.
Talk of disintegration now is fashionable in some quarters.
Two weeks ago, a faction of the Movement for the Survival of
Ogoni People (MOSOP) issued a Declaration of Independence
in Nigeria and designed a flag representing the sovereignty of
the Ogoni people. Calls for self-determination by the South
East-based Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign
State of Biafra (MASSOB) have intensified. Last week,
MASSOB was reported to have applied for UN observer
status. Add to these developments, the new sense of Ijaw
ethnic consciousness, similar ethnic agitations and Boko
Haram’s anomie and you realize all is not well with Nigeria.
It is clear that centrifugal forces have gained strength and this
noxious gain is substantially due to the intramural
machinations that define the ruling party.
•Fourth, for the majority of Nigerians, the economy functions
as an obstacle not an ally. Government claims that Nigeria
enjoys the world’s third fastest growing economy with annual
GDP growth of roughly 7 percent. This handsome figure
contrasts with the unattractive lives most people endure.
Income inequality is among the worst in the world. A higher
percentage of Nigerians now wallow in abject poverty since
the ruling party came to power. With insecurity escalating
across large swaths of the land, electricity generation at a
miserable 4,000 MGWs for an entire nation of over 150
million people, the collapse of the manufacturing industry
and spiraling unemployment figures of youths and college
graduates, it is difficult to take the GDP figure at face value.
The Nigerian government finds it convenient to lie. If by
happenstance the GDP approximates the truth, it means super-
elite within the elite benefits enormously while the rest of the
nation suffers. True national prosperity cannot be founded on
such a top-heavy architecture. Most Nigerians believe their
lives are much harder now more than 13 years ago and getting
worse. The hope that people still have about the future has
nothing to do with the quality of government economic
policy. It is mostly due to an innate sense of optimism that is
a uniquely Nigerian trait which defies the normal standards of
logic. It is one of the things that keeps Nigeria afloat though
so many things say it should have already drowned.
• The picture I have painted is stark but accurate, harsh but
not hopeless. If I thought things were beyond hope, I would
pursue another vocation. I am glued to this path because I
believe a democratic, responsive government can improve
Nigeria. However, if it persists along current policy lines, the
federal government will resolve nothing and will preside over
a worsening state.
•I do not claim the opposition to be a choir of angels. We are
not. Not all who call themselves to be opposition politicians
are bona fide democrats. There is a principled opposition and
an opportunistic one. Some are disgruntled elements of the
current regime who have slipped into the opposition for a
chance to settle personal scores or to advance personal
ambitions through a different route. These people are
opposition in name only; in reality, they are but the
photographic negative of the status quo they purport to
oppose.
•Nor do I believe those in power are evil incarnate. Some are
decent people. However, the governing system they have
created and the dominant values under which that system
operates extinguishes these people’s finer qualities. The
overriding concern of the PDP political community is to retain
power, not to advance the public welfare. With all our gaps
and imperfections, the opposition is possessed of greater civic
purpose and has in mind substantive policies qualitatively
better than the toxin the current government is brewing.
•In the rest of this address, I will contrast the policies of my
party, the Action Congress of Nigeria, with those of
government. You will see that we have significantly different
visions. The problem with our current rulers is not that they
don’t love Nigeria. They love the concept of Nigeria well
enough. The real problem is that they care little for the
average Nigerian.
•Insecurity: A growing nemesis
igeria is fast becoming one of the most dangerous places on
earth. The stories of militia killings, brutal attacks and
bombings we thought restricted to Afghanistan, Iraq or
Somalia are now daily fare in Nigeria. In Boko Haram,
Nigeria confronts a creeping, low-grade, brutal insurgency.
These extremists oppose more than the current
Administration; they threaten Nigerian democracy. Large
parts of the country now lie outside the authority and control
of federal government. People in these areas are more
cognizant of the extremists’ senseless violence than they are
assured of the government’s ability to stop it.
•There has been energetic debate whether poverty or a
distorted Islamic radicalism feeds Boko Haram’s emergence.
The debate is unnecessary. Both are factors. Poverty is a
terrible weight that most of its sufferers bear silently. What
rankles is not simply poverty but poverty occasioned by
injustice. When young people concluded that their lives are
finished before they start and that the reason for this is the
corruption of government and established leaders, enter
radical and violent ideas about Islam as the wrecking ball to
tear down the corrupt edifice. Without this combustive
mixture of poverty and injustice, Boko Haram would be a
fringe movement with a few members engaged in petty crime.
Because of this combination, Boko Haram is a socio-political
reality with many members and even more sympathizers.
Boko Haram is succeeding in its agenda to upend Nigeria. Not
only has it challenged government authority across the North,
it has revived ethno-religious antagonisms that were better left
buried.
•In the face of this threat, government has been ambivalent.
One day, government states it will forcibly deal with the
group. The next day government leans toward negotiations.
Although this problem has been with us for some time, policy
coordination remains ineffective. Because Government fears
decisive action will produce political fallout, they have
resolved to be irresolute. Thus, government has done little
except leave an over-stretched and under-equipped police
force, backed by army units in the most heavily-scarred
locations, to respond to Boko Haram attacks and dispel their
cells. The most one can say is that government policy is one
of soft containment. This has proven to be ineffective, and
perhaps counter-productive.
• Government must realize BH is more than a law
enforcement problem. It is a socio-political threat of such
magnitude that confronting it can no longer be subservient to
crass political calculations. Government must operate on a
grander scale. While I do not fully agree with Assistant
Secretary Carson’s proposal to create a Ministry of Northern
Nigeria, I endorse the implication central to his
recommendation: bold, strategic innovation is required.
•Correct policy must be twofold. First, it must protect the
people from repeated attacks. Second, it must weaken the
extremist organization. Clandestine groups of this nature are
comprised of factions of hardliners, pragmatists and casual
followers. The task at hand is to drive a wedge between the
other sub-groups and the hardliners. The pragmatists will be
amenable to negotiation and reintroduction into society. As a
socio-political solution is being fashioned in a way that
reduces the number, operational breadth and political strength
of BH, government can then treat the reduced number of
hardliners as more strictly a law enforcement matter. What
follows are important suggestions that government should
explore to achieve these objectives:
•Improve local community-based information-gathering and
sharing.

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