All we are saying…give us our President!

One of the most enduring images of the 2015 presidential campaigns was General Muhammadu Buhari dancing to the fuji music of Wasiu Ayinde Marshal on the soap-box in Ibadan.

It was only a few seconds of swinging to the rhythm, but it sent the mammoth crowd into a wild roar! Surprised by his own feat, the man who would be President publicly marveled at himself: “I can’t remember the last time I danced.” That’s if he ever did!

But so powerful was that gesture that though it would be a stretch to say it won him the election, it certainly won him more than a few more hearts that day. It was Buhari, so human!

It is still not clear why President Buhari has made a habit of cancelling all his engagements in recent days. But whatever the reasons, doing so and without good explanations too, is costing him dear, robbing him of his humanity and severing his much desired connection to the people.

He first failed to show up in Lagos even when all preparations had been made. And, insultingly, no serious explanation was given by the Presidency on why the trip was cancelled. Indications were that the Lagos visit was long in planning. Dashing the hopes of the people at the last minute therefore was difficult to live down.

If there ever could be any advertisement of shoddiness in government in recent times, that botched visit was it.Then came the visit to the Niger Delta and another one to Senegal which the President did not make last week without any coherent explanation, leading to all kinds of speculations.

For sure, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has cut enough tapes, delivered enough speeches and attended enough banquets on President Muhammadu Buhari’s behalf to be considered for a place in a book of records. While it is within the President’s right and power to delegate duties to anyone, putting up appearances of tardiness in managing his schedule by setting him up for a trip only to cancel it at the last minute does not do his image any good. And it certainly shames his handlers!

There is no reason for the presidential itinerary to be so badly or inefficiently managed. Not even security! If anything, such disruptions as we have seen in the last two weeks would seem to undermine national security by creating the ambience for unfounded speculations and theories. They also portray the President as insensitive to the feelings of the people.

For a President who was elected in the circumstance Buhari was, who rode to power on the crest of immense goodwill and enjoys the trust of the people as has hardly ever been seen, the cancelled visits only succeeded in fouling up the atmosphere for him.

The symbolisms of power can sometimes be more powerful than its substance. The subtle messages sent to the people in words and appearances can sometimes portray the leader as being in tune or out of touch with his people.

I have often challenged the President to make the symbolic gesture of visiting the Niger Delta, even staying there for a few days, a priority. My argument is that he will be sending a message of care to the people of that devastated region in more ways than one and such visit would help his plans for them.

Therefore, I can imagine the disappointment of the people of the Niger Delta over his failure to show up last week. For a leader in a democracy, aloofness and incoherence are bad enough. To add an appearance of insolence is almost politically suicidal.

Eloquence has never been Buhari’s strong suit. But he can make up for that by showing up in places where his presence is needed. Or, at least, give the nation explanations when he is unavoidably unable to show up, lest his absence becomes another evidence of a perceived contempt for the people.

If he is not convinced of that, he should ponder the damage being done even to his person with all sorts of speculations and rumours, and save himself and his government unnecessary embarrassment.

Even if the president was a bit below the weather, a speculation which official silence has given room to, but which has been vigorously denied, what is the crime in that? At 73, Buhari looks and acts young enough for his age. And I challenge those who would want to make mockery of old age to produce any 40 year-old who would run the kind of grueling schedule of work and travel the president has run in the last one year and not break down!

So, why would the presidential handlers not come out with that or any reason for that matter, for his inability to make it to his official engagements?

This reminds me of the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua and how a very decent and humble man, a honest leader and a genuinely patriotic Nigerian was almost robbed of his humanity by incompetent aides, selfish acolytes and an over-zealous state apparatus.

Even before he was installed president and commander-in-chief, Yar’adua’s no frills nature was well known. When he paid a courtesy call on the offices of this newspaper shortly before his election in 2007, his modest looks were striking. His appearance was not what you would expect of an aspiring president, or, at least, a sitting governor as he then was. Aversed to over-zealous courtiers, he made no secret of being himself or being just human.

Even with a voice so gentle, he could not be dissuaded from speaking about just anything, including his health, which was the subject of so much concern and speculation then. That impression was reinforced when I later met him at the State House, in the company of three of my colleagues, for the only long interview he ever granted in office as President.

The speculations about his deteriorating health and talks of his impending death had taken on the air of a wicked soap opera to which the whole world was treated in the most macabre manner. But the man himself was his own best public relations manager on the matter, as he was always the first to tell anybody who had a chance to meet him that he was ill! He would even discuss with you some details of the condition and the improvement he was making.

So it was that at the interview, he took questions for hours, to our surprise, and to the surprise of many public commentators, who would later insinuate that the interview was contrived. The man, according to them, “could not have endured that level of grilling.”

But Yar’adua not only had a strong grasp of the issues, he had clear details about how to proceed on solving Nigeria’s problems then. And he was almost unstoppable as he reeled out those details.

Of course, the temptation to ask about his health was irresistible. And when I did, he expressed his incredulity at how aides mystified issues about his health, leaving room for unnecessary speculations. He spoke of the mortality of every human being and wondered why people obsessed themselves with his life when he could go on living while those presumed to be healthy could even go before him. He illustrated this with the story of his sister, hale and hearty, who suddenly died around that period.

When I drew attention to how well he had spoken for hours with so much clarity of thought and voice, and remarked how well he looked in spite of his health, he interjected with a do-not-deceive-me: “I know I look frail!”

How truthful! How human!
Although, as it turned out, he was terminally ill, not only did he come across as a man comfortable in his lean frame and condition, he was true to himself!

This experience compelled me to say after many other events unfolded, before his eventual passing, that he must have been horrified by the secrecy built around him in the final days, a secrecy so bad that even governors, including his son-in-law, Isa Yuguda of Bauchi State, who traveled to Saudi Arabia where he went for treatment, were not allowed to see him, until he died.

I have narrated this to explain the damage often done to a leader’s reputation by over-zealous aides, family members or acolytes who strip him of his humanity and create a monster that does not exist.Democracy is not helped by needless surprises. Such can only lead to distrust and undermine a leader’s integrity.

Buhari is not the kind of leader for whom distance should be created from the people. He carries an aura of trust and respect which are needed to inspire a people presently enduring hard times, with the most terrible economic conditions in recent recollection, and living with memories of cold-blooded betrayal by a pillaging elite. He is the only hope they have in these times of despair, and seeing him, symbolic as that may seem, counts for something.No matter what, all we are saying is: Give us our President. Or tell us how he is doing, if it comes to that!