Chinweizu: 2015 : Between liberation and slavery (1)

AFTER that historical backgrounder, I shall now examine four election issues, the two on everybody’s mind  – Corruption and Insecurity, with insecurity in the two forms of Boko Haram and The Fulani militia, plus two others that are not but should be on everybody’s mind namely, the 1999 Constitution –hereafter referred to as the Constitution; and Candidate Buhari.  So all in all I shall examine 5 distinct election issues: Corruption; Boko Haram; The Fulani Militia; the 1999 Constitution; Candidate Buhari.

  (1) On Corruption, I submit that, under the Constitution, no President of Nigeria can tackle corruption without inviting impeachment, simply because corruption is encouraged and protected by the constitution which he is sworn to enforce.

(2) On Boko Haram, I submit that it is partly funded through the structures of the Constitution and can’t be extinguished without first discarding the Constitution. I also submit that a military solution to Boko Haram is not possible under the Constitution.

(3) On The Fulani Militia, I submit that it is an ethnic cleansing and land grabbing instrument of the Caliphate and a mortal danger to all other Nigerians, and that it can’t be curbed under the Constitution.

(4) On the Constitution, I submit that it is the godfather of corruption, as well as the codification of the sources of all the vices that plague Nigeria, and that Nigeria cannot be reformed without discarding it. Though ostensibly democratic, its frauds make it a fake-democracy constitution.

(5) On Candidate Buhari, I submit that he has neither the will nor the ability to discard the Constitution but has every reason to perpetuate it. Accordingly he can’t solve any of the problems whose solution requires discarding the Constitution. So, those who expect him to change Nigeria by solving these problems are taking themselves for a ride.

   From these submissions I argue that because these top problems – Corruption, Insecurity in its Boko Haram and Fulani Militia forms – can be solved only after scrapping the Constitution; so, the principal election issue becomes the Constitution itself and how to replace it.  Hence, this election should be decided by the answer the candidates give to just one question: What’s your program for replacing the Constitution? 

I shall now discuss these submissions one by one.

(1) Corruption;

On Corruption, I submit that, under the Constitution, no President of Nigeria can tackle corruption without inviting impeachment, simply because corruption is encouraged and protected by the constitution which he is sworn to enforce. Here is why.

    First of all, let’s get terminologically accurate. What we call “corruption” in Nigeria is actually lootocracy –the government of the people, by organized crime syndicates or mafias a.k.a. political parties, for the looting of the treasury. 

    Secondly, the 1999 Constitution has entrenched and institutionalized lootocracy. The constitution, by its so-called security vote together with its immunity clause for the top office holders, effectively invites them to loot with impunity. And, naturally, what the top officers of the state do, their subordinates emulate. 

   During the National Dialogue, in my piece in The Guardian titled “Four reasons to scrap the 1999 Constitution,” I pointed out that the 1999 Constitution is the godfather of corruption, through the immunity clause 308. (1), which protects, and thereby implicitly invites, looting by the highest officials who have brazenly set the terrible example that the rest of society have emulated. However, it ostentatiously declares in Section 14. (5) that ‘The State shall abolish all corrupt practices and abuse of power’, thus giving the impression that it is for fighting corruption. But it then surreptitiously annuls Section 14. (5) by Section 6. (6)(c), its ouster clause. It is a fraud for the godfather of corruption to give the impression that it is against corruption, and the fraud is compounded when it empowers the state to fight corruption but then surreptitiously discourages it from doing so. That’s double duplicity!

    Because of this fraud of an ouster, which makes non-justiciable its provision that “The State shall abolish all corrupt practices and abuse of power”,  so long as we have that constitution, nobody can end lootocracy. 

That fraud aside, the cost of seeking office  under the system created by the 1999 Constitution is so high that only looters or those sponsored by and beholden to looters (godfathers) can seek election to any public office at any level – LGA, state, or federal. And Nigerians expect them to end looting after they are elected? You got to be out of your mind or just fooling yourself!

   Given that the Constitution has entrenched and institutionalized lootocracy by these devices, if a president – who is sworn to uphold the constitution –attempts to fight lootocracy, he would be breaking his oath of office and inviting impeachment. 

  The fact of life is that Nigerians live by “corruption”, they grow rich by “corruption”, or aspire to do so whenever they get the opportunity. At donation time, they celebrate the looters who donate to their causes. And, contradictorily, they can’t do without the pleasure of complaining about “corruption”. That daily ritual is part of their daily entertainment and frustration reliever. For these reasons, any anti-corruption talk in Nigeria is either a joke or a scam. 

    As far as the political charade is concerned, anybody who wants to get into office and loot the state coffers knows that the easy way to excite and dupe the voters is to pose as an anti-corruption fighter. But when he gets there, as he already knows, he can’t do anything about it because the constitution has entrenched and given protection to “corruption”. Because of the constitutional obstacle to eliminating “corruption”, it should not be an issue in any Nigerian election. It is a false issue, a problem that no candidate or party can do anything about. Their making an issue of it is like cripples boasting about which of them can run a mile in four minutes. In election contests, it should be removed and replaced with the issue of what to do about the fraudulent constitution that protects “corruption.”

   The tragedy is that even those who want a True Federalism Constitution, TFC, didn’t do enough, especially during the National Dialogue, to make the 1999 Constitution the main issue in the public mind. So, “corruption” continues to obsess the public, and regardless of who Jega’s INEC proclaims the winner, the lootocracy is safe, and the looting will go on, and on and on, and so too the clamor against “corruption”, until Nigerians get tired of the charade and face the reality that the 1999 Constitution must be removed as the first step if lootcracy is to be tamed.

   Hence, anybody who thinks that, under Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution, any government, party or president can eradicate corruption is like a man who expects a worm to give birth to a lion, or who wants to go to heaven but doesn’t want to die.

(2) Boko Haram

On Boko Haram, I submit that it is partly funded through the structures of the Constitution and can’t be extinguished without first discarding the Constitution. I also submit that a military solution to Boko Haram is not possible under the Constitution.

 Who gave Boko Haram to Nigeria?

In 2012, we got this statement from Mustapha Jokolo, the former No 2 man in the Caliphate system:

Northern politicians created Boko Haram – Mustapha Jokolo, former Emir of Gwandu

https://elombah.com/index.php/articles-mainmenu/10385-northern-politicians-created-boko-harammustapha-jokolo-former-emir-of-gwandu Published on Friday, 30 March 2012 11:46

    The Constitution helps to support the Boko Haram insurgency. How?

The Constitution helps to fund Boko Haram through the federal funding of the Shariya states and their governors. Being the governors of Shariyaland states, their sympathies are with Boko Haram which is campaigning for implementation of Shari’a. How much of these funds end up in Boko Haram hands needs to be investigated.

   Can Boko Haram be defeated under the Constitution? Probably not, because by the structures and provisions of the Constitution:

1: the governments of the Shariyaland states will get statutory budget allocations which the Boko Haram sponsors among them can divert to their terrorist agency – Boko Haram.

2: The fifth column of Boko Haram sympathizers from those states will remain part of the Nigerian military, and will continue, from the inside, to sabotage military operations against Boko Haram as in this report by London based EAGLE EYE REPORT WORLDWIDE:

The apprehension and detention of 9 northern generals for supporting the northern insurgents has grave implications for Nigeria that makes irrelevant all talk of any election by the politicians for April 2015. The Nigerian Army can’t last as a cohesive organisation for much longer.

  The Junior northern officers are actively planning a coup because they know that the courtmarshal process of those 9 Gambari generals will invariably affect them also as they will be implicated for following direct orders of those generals.

  The punishment for charge of mutiny, sabotage, treason etc charges laid against these 9 courtmashaled generals in military tribunals is usually firing squad just like coup.

THE ECDYSIS OF BOKO HARAM MODUS OPERANDI ANOTHER MIRAGE; EAGLE EYE REPORT WORLDWIDE Tuesday, May 20, 2014 

https://eagleyereportconnect.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-ecdysis-of-boko-haram-modus.html 

 3: The Boko Haram sponsors who are embedded in all levels of the Nigerian state apparatus will continue to obstruct efforts to politically defeat Boko Haram, and will supply intelligence to Boko Haram. As President Jonathan revealed back in 2012: 

   “Boko Haram is everywhere, in the executive arm of government, in the legislative arm of government and even in the judiciary. Some are also in the armed forces, the police and other security agencies,” Jonathan said. “Some continue to dip their hands and eat with you and you won’t even know the person who will point a gun at you or plant a bomb behind your house.” 

President: Boko Haram has infiltrated govt, military. https://www.thenationonlineng.net/2011/index.php/news/32611-president-boko-haram-has-infiltrated-govt-military.html09/01/2012; (Accessed Oct 2012).

• To be continued tomorrow

• Professor Chinweizu wrote this as a contribution to the Abuja symposium On “National Confab And The 2015 General Elections” On Monday, February 2, 2015