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How Nigerian youth should respond to Buhari

By Oyeniran Abioje
08 May 2018   |   4:11 am
The President, General Muhammadu Buhari (GMB) perceives Nigerian youths as lazy people who can neither rule nor fight for their rights. It is up to the youths to justify GMB or prove him wrong. There can be no better way of proving GMB wrong than for the youths to unite behind a capable and reliable person.

Muhammadu Buhari

The President, General Muhammadu Buhari (GMB) perceives Nigerian youths as lazy people who can neither rule nor fight for their rights. It is up to the youths to justify GMB or prove him wrong. There can be no better way of proving GMB wrong than for the youths to unite behind a capable and reliable person. Musicians and other artists can use their intellectual and human resources to help bail Nigeria out of incessant crisis bedeviling and wrecking her. They should mobilise their large admirers, nationwide. Posterity will never forget Charles Oputa (Charlie Boy) who, with his group, initiated the protests that spread to London and sent GMB back to Nigeria, after wasting untold amounts of money. A more conscientious President would have come back home much earlier for recuperation. And now he is seeking reelection that will make him stay in power until he is 81.

Another old man, Alhaji Abubakar Atiku, 72, is bracing up to succeed GMB. He too, if elected, will end his second term when he is 81. I once told Atiku that since he already built a university after serving as Nigeria’s Vice-president, 1999-2007, what else is he looking for? Much more crucially is that Nigeria must respect rotational presidency for peace, progress, and stability. I advocate that we should forget whatever grudge we have against the octogenarian former President, General Olusegun Obasanjo (OBJ), and cooperate with him to help us coordinate refashioning of Nigeria. The country, as constituted, currently, is not sustainable. Unregulated survival of the fittest was not done even by African ancestors/ancestresses; hence, for instance in Yorubaland, they have a number of ruling houses, based on certain historical yardsticks.

Nigeria has six zones. Southwest already served two terms in Aso Rock, in person of OBJ. South-south has also served eight years there in person of Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan. GMB is serving the second term of the northwest. Why should the northwest be allowed a third term? That is the survival of the fittest I am talking about. For the north to balance the south in the new dispensation dating back to 1999, north-central should be supported to win in 2019, and after eight years, the southeast, then the northeast, before the southwest again. Why cannot Nigeria follow political order with a sense of discipline? De-politicisation of religion is also paramount, because national survival under Christian-Muslim onslaughts is impossible. Whatever is standing on the way of Nigeria’s progress should be resolved by the Third Force Movement. I don’t see any personal benefit to OBJ than earning a better name for himself and a better (sustainable) Nigeria for us.

Innocent Ujah Idibia (aka 2Baba), in his early 40s, is “a singer, songwriter, record producer and entrepreneur,” from Jos, Plateau State, studied at Institute of Management Technology, Enugu, is a good example of someone from the north-central who can be Nigeria’s President in 2019. He had also tried to organise protests for some good cause. Nigerian youths shouldn’t afford to sit on the fence, looking at an old man perpetrating endless bloodshed and buying war planes. They should join the Third Force Movement to refashion Nigeria. History and posterity are watching. God and African ancestors/ancestresses are watching. Too many youths have been compromised. GMB is bribing some youths with N30, 000 monthly. Yes, it is something, but what? How many years will it take somebody earning N30, 000 monthly to buy the type of motorcycle that Yusuf was riding, or to feed monthly and still build a business?
Prof. Abioje wrote from University of Ilorin.

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