Written by Emmanuel Onwe

The magic of sai Buhari is the very antithesis of the poetic inevitability of President Goodluck Jonathan’s ambition. In my previous effort on this page last week, I admonished Jonathan that “This is not the time to sing Rock of Ages with a cleft in which you will hide yourself. This is precisely the moment to sing Stand up! Stand up! Let courage rise with danger and strength to strength oppose.”

In this turn, I say to General Buhari: Be reminded that the keys that lock doors are the very same keys that open them. I can express passionate views about this soldier partly because I know nothing about him on a personal level and partly because he has for decades inspired my deepest curiosity. I have studied his public profile with a great deal of concentration.

My first and only ever encounter with him was brought about by chance. This occurred at Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, in December, 2010. The General sauntered into the VIP lounge – aristocratic in bearing, charming in comportment, cosmopolitan in his quasi-gregariousness. Everyone in the room rose to their feet.

“Who is that man?” whispered a foreigner who inhaled the opiate charm exuded by the General. Buhari brought such awe, serenity and dignified self-effacement into the room. It was quite a cocktail of personal aura and magic. Sai Buhari! He is the most towering politician in the Muslim North, adored and revered like a saint by his fellow adherents.

He has his scant or practically non-existent following in the South but this is a man who can sit in his house and win 12 states in the core of northern Nigeria in a presidential election without lifting an eyebrow. At political rallies, his admirers sway in ecstasy and rapture, dizzy with the magical, electrifying aura of their idol. They scream “sai Buhari” over and over ad infinitum et ultra.

Their love translates to their certitude of their hero’s impeccable character, moral rectitude and inflexible honesty of purpose. I was a teenager when Buhari romped into office as a military head of state; and still so when he was overthrown. My practical experience of his reign is negligible but the chill of the war against indiscipline, his flagship public policy, was felt even by adolescents.

But as a keen student of history, the era of Buhari’s totalitarian supremacy is one I sip like a vintage wine. This is not by any means an approbative commentary on dictatorship. The General Muhammadu Buhari years brought about the consciousness of discipline in all facets of public life. Those who were found guilty of corruption were quickly flushed out of the system.

The exportation of 100,000 barrels of refined petroleum products per day was achieved and domestic demand was met without breaking a sweat. The foundations for a functional society were everywhere laid. The war against indiscipline was waged and prosecuted with martial single mindedness. Yes, as a lawyer, the repugnance at the retroactivity of laws rankles with particular acidity and I abhor and condemn it unreservedly.

But his one and a half years in power were, comparatively, a golden period for Nigeria. General Buhari wept during the finale of his presidential campaign under Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, on 13th April, 2011. This reflexive, uncalculated exposition of his vulnerable humanity sealed his explosive emotional bond with his millions of northern Muslim followers. It is understandable that his political foes ridiculed the moment, because in adversarial partisan politics even the innocent smile of a baby is open to slander.

But anyone who cared to pay attention to the specifics of the speech that brought the General to tears, would readily appreciate the pain that pierced his patriotic tear duct: “After being head of state, I am sure I could easily have retired into a life of comfort and ease as an elder statesman, as a contractor or as a beneficiary of anyone of the nation’s many generous prebendal offerings. “But that is not what I wish to do with my life.

And so, if I don’t take any of these alternative courses of action, it should be clear that I am not in this for the love of office or for pursuit after personal glory or in order to achieve some personal goal. Far be it from me that this should be.

“I need nothing and I have nothing more to prove. I am in this solely for the love of my country and concern for its destiny and the fate of its people. And that is why, despite the many disappointments along the way, I am still in the struggle and will remain in it to the end. I have decided to dedicate the remainder of my life to fighting for the people of this country- until their right is restored to them.”

They say he is clannish, feudal, fanatical and unforgiving. His notorious bloody dogs and baboons comments were condemned by his detractors as an incitement to violence (his admirers praised it as an incitement to vigilance). These are mere descriptions and ascriptions – the bad name given to a dog in order to hang it. If he is as thoroughly despicable as alleged, why do so many enlightened Nigerians swoon with nostalgia for the Buhari years? The years of order, decency in public space and public service?

Admittedly, there is a yawning chasm between the adoration he receives in the North and the suspicion and hostility that attend him in the South. And this was brought into practical politics in the last presidential election.

Buhari accumulated some 12.2 million votes in the election but in none of 16 southern states did he score up to 4 percent (four percent!) of the votes. The singular exception was Oyo State where he scored 11 percent. This means that even if the North had given him 100 million votes, he would still not have had the mandate of the Nigerian people, either constitutionally or morally.

Conversely, in the 12 Northern states which Jonathan lost to Buhari, the President still managed to score more than 30percent in many of them except in Kano, Borno and Bauchi where he could not break above 18percent. But in the current political climate, there have emerged new alliances that have thrown up heavy weights with potential knockout punches fighting on the side of Buhari.

Therefore, as far as the 2015 presidential election is concerned, President Goodluck Jonathan is one issue. General Muhammadu Buhari is the other. The presidential contest is about these two men.

Neither is pledged to any known political ideology but their respective worldviews are polar opposite – and this is as far as ideological politics goes in Nigeria. Therefore, the choice presented to Nigerians by these two men is a sharply contrasted one.

If he wins five states in the Southwest and adds Adamawa, Nasarawa and Kwara to his traditional coalition and with just 25 percent of the votes in Kogi, Plateau, Edo, Taraba and Benue, Buhari will be sworn in as president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on May 29, 2015. Take this to the bank – and if you are a Jonathan supporter, you pray that it bounces. Sai Buhari!

http://newtelegraphonline.com/2015-buhari-and-the-magic-of-sai-buhari/