How The VP Office Manipulates Facts To Fight Abba Kyari

There is a tussle for influence inside Nigeria’s Presidential Villa, and every discerning Nigerian can see it. But we’re being manipulated to see and interpret it wrongly through a well-orchestrated media spin to alter reality.

There had been several in the past, but the latest is a report published by the Premium times on November 5 with the very provocative headline: How Abba Kyari manipulated Buhari to sack Osinbajo from Ruga projects. While the report contains factual information, they were deliberately twisted to achieve a sinister objective.

The writer said the online paper obtained documents showing how the Chief of Staff to the President, Abba Kyari, “intercepted” and “moderated” official memos from the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to Buhari.

The paper revealed Mr. Osinbajo sought the president’s approval for three proposals relating to the development of the National Livestock Transformation Plan (NLTP) which Buhari had mandated him to lead when the country was experiencing a dangerous herdsmen/farmers violence in parts of the country.

The writer made his readers believe that the VP wrote a memo to the President dated April 12, 2019 explaining agreement with all the stakeholders and requesting approval. However, the writer states: “But rather than forwarding the vice president’s memo to the president for approval, Mr Kyari held it for more than a month, eventually submitting it to the president on May 16.”

The report also mentions that the VP reminded the President that the sum of N35 billion had been earmarked for the livestock transformation policy, out of which N12 billion had already been released for ruga projects (construction of ranches for Fulani herders along designated grazing routes).

Mr. Osinbajo pleaded in the memo that since N12 billion had been earmarked for immediate use, the President should approve release of N22 billion for the longtime implementation of the project.

The report then claims that “before he submitted it, the chief of staff reworked the memo to include his own observation and recommendations to the president,” adding that Kyari advised the President to reject his VP’s request because the N12 billion voted for the Ruga projects had not been fully utilized.

The report goes on to give the false impression that the President had no regard for the VP and that the chief of staff had become bigger than the VP.

Anyone who read the report would not fail to see from where it came and what it was intended to achieve. It was an ingenuous plot to use the media to create a different reality. The reporter was handed documents and fed with lies about what had transpired. It was somebody trying to unfairly make another a fall guy to achieve a premeditated objective, which may soon come to light.

Obviously, the attempt was to deceive the public who may not know the inside working of government and how the presidency works under the President Muhammadu Buhari administration. Let us examine the first allegation that Kyari held on to the VP’s memo for one month. This is not only false; it is a wicked lie.

Every presidency staff knows Osinbajo has access to the President and usually takes his memos directly to him. So, lets get it right, Osinbajo never forwarded any memo to the chief of staff. Even though protocol demands that all official communications to the president must pass through the table of the chief of staff, Osinbajo goes direct to the president. I challenge the VP to dispute this fact.

Secondly, it was president Buhari himself who sought the advice of his chief of staff after receiving the request from his VP, and not Kyari jumping the gun by imposing his opinion on the VP’s memo before passing it to the President as they want us to believe.

It is a known fact that as the chief of staff to the president, Kyari is the closest adviser to Buhari and the president must naturally seek his advice on important issues of state, no matter who brought it to his attention. And it would be dis-ingenuous to blame an adviser for a patriotic advice to his principal as is clearly the case here.

I quite appreciate why the VP may feel hurt or humiliated by the President’s rejection of his proposal and taking him off implementation of the NLTP which he worked hard to promote. But one must take a dispassionate look at the arguments of the VP in his memo to the President and the advice of the chief of staff to appreciate that the rejection was not based on any sentiments but on the strength of the arguments.

According to the documents quoted by the report, Kyari was said to have advised the President thus: “Given that the president has approved N12 billion for intervention for the Ruga Model, through the National Food Security Council (NFSC), we respectfully recommend that we first evaluate the development impact of this particular project before releasing further amounts for the NLTP.

“This is key especially as major security operations are ongoing in some of these locations.”

And on the VP’s request for an inclusive Steering Committee to be inaugurated to drive the livestock transformation policy, Kyari advised: “This plan may not be an effective strategy due to the overriding importance of farmer/herder issues in the National Food Security Council, which Mr. President is the chairman.”

The chief of staff then proceeded to recommend that Buhari should scrap the NLTP and said: “ To avoid duplication of efforts, we respectfully recommend (with emphasis) that Mr. President retains oversight of the farmer/herder issues under the NFSC,” which includes all heads of security and intelligence agencies as well as representatives of governors from the six geopolitical zones.

As part of the long term solution, Kyari also recommended to the President the establishment of a National Livestock and Fisheries Commission that would be responsible for “formulating, implementing, monitoring and evaluating all projects relating to ranching, fisheries and other related issues.”

It is hard for me, and certainly for knowledgeable and patriotic Nigerians, to see how a president would not be persuaded by the arguments advanced by the chief of staff. Not only is the reasoning very sound, but also the arguments represent the vision of the Buhari administration. The advice fulfills the President’s desire to be prudent with the resources of the country even as it moves to solve the myriad of problems facing the nation.

The VP, more than anyone, by know ought to understand President Buhari better after working with him for four years. And in truth, the VP has demonstrated an almost telepathic understanding of his principal and had come out to defend many of his actions, even unpopular ones.

That is why one may be right to see the campaign of calumny against Kyari as the self-imposed task of fifth columnists seeking to knock heads inside the presidential villa. But it is discomforting that the VP or his office, have yet to react to the Premium times report unlike in the past when reports had directly attacked the VP. Perhaps, it is a silence of consent!

-Philip Emmanuel is a retired public servant who writes from Lagos.

Disclaimer: This article is entirely the opinion of the writer and does not represent the views of The Whistler.