WHEN Muhammadu Buhari
overthrew a democratically-
elected government in a coup
d”etat in 1983, Sani Abacha
declared in his infamous
radio broadcast: “(Our) health
services are in shambles as
our hospitals are reduced to
mere consulting clinics
without drugs, water and
equipment.”
However, Buhari did not
address the shambolic
Nigerian health system in his
two years in power. In a
Vanguard article of 7th
February, 2015, Ambassador
Ignatius Olisemeka said of
Buhari: “He entrusted to me
the care and welfare of his
family- he sent his wife and
two children to me in
Washington D.C. for medical
treatment. His family were
with me in Washington D.C.
when the General was
overthrown in a coup d’état.”
Thus, while Buhari was
grandstanding as Mr. Fix-It,
he sought medical care
surreptitiously for his family
in the United States, instead
of fixing the Nigerian health
system. This typifies the
hypocrisy and insincerity of
Buhari as an agent of change.
It is all smoke and mirrors. It
is the same duplicity whereby
he claimed to be the apostle
of anti-corruption even while
being complicit in the
smuggling in of 53 suitcases
at Murtala Mohammed
Airport, Lagos in the middle
of a currency change.
Buharinomics
Buhari’s grandstanding must
not be allowed to go
unchallenged today, now that
he is seeking election under
the same kind of democratic
system he truncated and
trashed in the past. We must
not allow Buhari to sweep his
ignominious past under the
carpet of a bogus mantra of
“change.” Indeed, there is
something anomalous about
presenting a 72 year-old
former military dictator as a
change candidate. What kind
of change can be represented
by an old has-been?
In his first coming, the
“changes” Buhari brought
were to Nigeria’s detriment.
Under him, the Nigerian
economy went from bad to
worse. Our national debt rose
from $14 billion to $18 billion
in less than two years; with
the result that Nigeria was no
longer able to meet its
financial obligations to global
bankers. We had to queue for
essential commodities, such
as bread and milk, which
were hard to find. Raw
materials and spare parts
needed to keep factories
running were scarce. Rather
than create jobs, tens of
thousands of workers lost
their jobs. Inflation rose to
the astronomical level of 40%;
while it is now 7.9% under
Jonathan.
When Buhari seized power in
1983, Nigeria’s GDP was $
444.45. When he was
overthrown in 1985, Nigeria’s
GDP had dropped
dramatically to $344.14. That
is not the kind of change we
want. When Goodluck
Jonathan became president
in 2010, Nigeria’s GDP was $
369. By 2014, it had grown
dramatically to $510.
Buhari is going around
complaining about the recent
devaluation of the naira.
However, when he took over
in 1983, one dollar exchanged
for 0.724 naira. But by the
time he was overthrown in
1985, one dollar exchanged
for 0.894 naira. That is 23%
devaluation in barely two
years. However, when
Jonathan took over in 2010,
one dollar exchanged for $
167 naira. Five years later, it
is now $202.55. That is a
devaluation of 21% in five
years.
It is not surprising, therefore
that, when Buhari was
overthrown in 1985, there was
wild jubilation throughout the
length and breadth of the
country.
Unleashing the dogs and the
baboons
One of the first things Buhari
did when he seized power in
1984 was to gag the press.
Decree 4 was promulgated
making even the publishing of
the truth a criminal offence.
Under it, Nduka Irabor and
Tunde Thompson were jailed
maliciously in a manner
designed primarily to
intimidate the press.
Under Buhari, the SSS came
looking for me because I
published an article in
National Concord entitled:
“Counter-trading Nigeria’s
Future;” criticizing the
government’s return to the
stone age economic policy of
trade by barter which resulted
in even greater fraud than
import licensing. Buhari is
now angling to return to
power under a democratic
setting. But has this leopard
changed its skin? In spite of
his carefully crafted makeover
by his American handlers,
has Buhari changed from his
anti-democratic ways?
All the evidence suggests he
has not. Buhari is not even
president and he is already
fighting the press. Recently,
he threatened to back out of
the Abuja Peace Accord
concluded with Goodluck
Jonathan and the PDP
because he was upset about
the insults and attacks he
was receiving. He warned that
no one should regard his
“patriotic commitment to
maintaining national peace”
for weakness.
Buhari’s handlers declared:
“We cannot continue to
guarantee the tolerance limit
of our teeming supporters
nationwide who are daily
being inundated with death
wish commentaries on the
person of General
Muhammadu Buhari.” What
exactly does this mean? Is
Buhari now going to unleash
his infamous dogs and
baboons on Nigerians? This
is why it would be foolhardy
to mortgage the freedoms we
have come to enjoy under the
democratic dispensation by
handing power back to a man
who is intolerant of criticism.
Let us juxtapose Buhari’s
short fuse to the disposition
of Goodluck Jonathan.
Jonathan must be the most
wrongly vilified president in
the history of Nigeria. He has
been called all kinds of names
by his traducers. He has been
abused, reviled and
condemned by APC stalwarts.
His motorcade has been
stoned. His campaign posters
have been torn down. His
campaign ground has been
bombed. His wife has been
maligned. How has he
responded to all this?
Jonathan responded by
signing the Freedom of
Information bill. In effect,
instead of gagging the press,
in the tradition of malevolent
dictators like Buhari, he has
freed the press even more;
allowing it to criticize his
government without
hindrance. In every way
possible for the past five
years, Jonathan has assured
and reassured Nigerians that
freedom of expression is our
inalienable right.
The myth of Buhari’s
northern popularity
One of the lies of the Buhari
campaign is the pretense that
he has cornered the Northern
vote. Nothing could be
further from the truth. As a
matter of fact, in this election,
Buhari is not the choice of the
North. The Northern political
elite don’t want Buhari to be
president. The North did not
vote for him in the APC
presidential primaries. The
Northern vote went instead to
Rabiu Kwankwaso and Atiku
Abubakar. Buhari was elected
primarily with Southern ACN
votes.
Let me ask some pertinent
questions. How many
Northern elites have we seen
recently campaigning for
Buhari? We have seen Tinubu
following Buhari around. We
have heard Obasanjo and
Soyinka pitching their tents
with him. But the Northern
elite have largely kept mum.
Governors Fashola,
Oshiomole and Amaechi of
the South have been busy
singing choruses of praise
about Buhari, but Northern
governors are mute. Atiku
and Kwankwaso have largely
kept their distance from him.
Why are they not shouting on
the rooftops for Buhari? The
truth is that the Northern elite
have never liked Buhari.
Therefore, it is not in their
interest for him to become
president. Buhari’s
grandstanding on anti-
corruption resonates with the
poor, but not with the
Northern elite. Should Buhari
become president, most of
the current Northern
presidential hopefuls can no
longer be president in their
lifetime. Eight years of Buhari
presidency would swing the
presidency back to the South
for another eight years. But
these Northern bigwigs don’t
have 16 years to wait in the
wilderness. Some of them
would even have kicked the
bucket by then.
It is better for them to wait
for Jonathan to finish his
second-term in 2019, at
which time they would be
able to contest for the
presidency without having to
deal with an incumbent
president. What they need
now is the assurance that it
would then be the turn of the
North. In that eventuality,
South-South support for a
Northern presidential
candidate would be
imperative. 2015 is not the
time to jeopardize this.
The strategic partnership of
the North and the South-
South has been the enduring
decimal of Nigerian elections.
The South-South has
supported the North in every
election, except when its own
son, Goodluck Jonathan, was
on the ballot. The North must
be careful not to betray that
partnership, if for no other
reason than that it will need it
again in the near future. It
must be careful not to betray
that partnership because
Jonathan has done far more
for the North in his five years
in power than he has for any
other part of the country,
including the South-South. In
short, there is no excuse for
Northern denial of support for
Jonathan in 2015.
The federal government’s
mid-term assessment of its
development investment
shows that the investment in
the North-West and the
North-Central zones alone
amounted to 792 billion naira;
nearly double those of the
South-West, South-South and
South-East put together,
which amounted to 403
billion naira. If the North fails
to support Jonathan in the
coming presidential election,
in spite of Jonathan’s
obvious discrimination in
favour of the North, it can bid
farewell to South-South
support in the future.
With all the noise about
Buhari’s popularity with the
talakawa in the North, we
have not heard anything that
he has ever done, or would
do, for them. When he was
head of state between 1984
and 1985, he did absolutely
nothing for them. In the
unlikely event that Jonathan
becomes president, it would
not take long before there
would be rioting among the
Northern poor out of dashed
and betrayed hope.
The man who has
transformed the life of the
poor in the North has been
Goodluck Jonathan. Jonathan
built 125 Almajiri Schools in
13 states in the North;
something Northern rulers
like Buhari failed to do. At the
commissioning of the first
Almajiri Model School in Gagi,
Sokoto State, the Sultan of
Sokoto, Alhaji Abubakar
Sa’ad III, observed that
Jonathan’s action was
unprecedented in the history
of Northern Nigeria.
Jonathan also established ten
new federal universities;
seven of them in the North.
Jonathan has made far more
appointments of Northerners
than he has of Southerners.
His transformation of
agriculture from subsistence
to commercial farming has
been of primary benefit to the
agrarian North. Therefore, it
will come as no surprise if
Jonathan wins more votes in
the North in 2015 than he did
in 2011.
source: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/03/why-nigerians-must-reject-the-second-coming-of-buhari/?utm_source=&utm_medium=facebook

Instead it should be

Why Nigerians must reject the change we desire and why Nigerians must continue with the horrible status quo

Amaechi is in port harcourt

guess what?
He used the new east west road that was reconstructed by fg
i was expecting him to use his private jet.

Nice write up. Well said

Please tell us why we should vote GEJ. Not always telling us about Buhari.

I can only reject the second coming of Buhari if only i can also reject the second coming of Jesus christ




keep calm and vote Buhari
#I_Have_Decided
GMB 2015

[b]Please Ladies and gentlemen I welcome you to Nigeria where the GDP is growing yet we have more poverty among millions of nigerians..A GDP growth that is not having effect on the common man on the streets..

I welcome you to nigeria where they say there is transformation in agricultural sector yet it does not affect the price of common garri in the market..

I welcome you to a nigeria where they say they have transformed the power sector yet generators are even used at PHCN/NEPA office most nigerians don't even have 15 constant hours of power supply everyday......imagine PHCN office do not even have light...

I welcome you to nigeria where our foolish leaders have turned corruption into a big industry
..

I welcome you to a nigeria where a dollar is now 200 naira and above..

I welcome you to a nigeria where we have a president that can only reply to an alleged missing fund by saying "america will know"is that not lack of self esteem coming from the dumb president??must we rely on america in eveything we do??

I welcome you to nigeria where "stealing is not corruption"if you steal 20naira you will be killed,if you steal 20billion naira you will even be celebrated and even contest for an election and turn into a saint.......

I welcome you to a nigeria where almost every institutions go on strike,from ASUU strike to petroleum workers strike to doctors strike and so on....

I welcome you to a nigeria that has a president that is as clueless as clueless...I welcome you to a nigeria where the president acts like the first lady and the first lady acts like the president...[/b]

who cares