I Knew Buhari Will Fail Three Months After He Took Power – Prof Anya O Anya

Renowned Professor of Zoology and former Chairman of Nigerian Economic Summit Group, Prof Anya O. Anya has said he knew Nigerian President, Muhammadu Buhari, would fail three months after he took over from Goodluck Jonathan in 2015.

Buhari was declared the winner of the 2015 presidential election and was inaugurated few months later in Nigeria’s first inter-party transition of power.

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His victory gave hope that Nigeria’s democracy was growing.

Buhari anchored his election campaign on ‘Change’, a mantra he said will kill corruption, end insecurity and turn around the economy.

But Anya, who is the Pro-Chancellor and Chairman Governing Council of the Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike, Abia State, said any hope that the leadership crisis bedevilling the country was going to be solved was soon dashed by the style of Buhari.

In a scholarly paper he delivered recently on the topic NIGERIA: IN SEARCH OF STATESMEN, PATRIOTS AND ELDERS, Anya said the country’s problem is the “lack of vision, capacity and values,” citing a speech he delivered in 2015 in Port Harcourt – three months after the emergence of Buhari.

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In the speech, Anya had taken a dig at the Buhari administration which took almost six months of his tenure to form a cabinet.

Anya had said back in 2015, “In the last five months we have gone from euphoria of the change mantra to the reality check of governance in a plural society. Now we have passed the hallowed magic threshold of one hundred days. We have seen inelegant efforts to espy some success verging on the sycophantic, to the raucous reminiscent of a bolekaja melee as part of the condemnatory admonition of the less impressed.”

He also assessed the Buhari administration saying, “Three months on the chair of governance two strands have emerged besides the unrepentant cheer leaders – those who have voiced disappointment on the apparent slow pace of government business and those who have voiced apparent horror on the apparent sectional tilt of his appointments. Of those who raise eye-brows on the slow pace many have been disappointed that for a man who ran for the office on record four times he should have come to office better prepared and to hit the ground running.

“At the last count, out of thirty-two appointments including the strategic appointments of Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the Chief of Staff to the President of the Republic, twenty-six have been Northern. Almost unthinkable in a plural society some would say. Some have seen this as a loud trumpet proclaiming and reinforcing the view that the disposition of GMB cannot work with all Nigerians except those from his geographical enclave.”

In the paper he presented over the weekend, Anya further lamented Nigeria is currently assailed by many multi-dimensional problems at the same time, adding that it had never been this tough for the country.

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He said the security situation is horrendous with more than a decade long insurrection in the North East, ongoing banditry, kidnapping and other violent crimes in the North West alongside wilful destruction of communities and forceful eviction of farmers and other rural dwellers in the North Central by the lawless Fulani herdsmen or by people who have been described as ‘Bandits’ in the North Central.

He explained that in the South East, there is the menace of sectarian agitation anchored on the demand for self-determination for a Biafra Republic even as the movement for secession of an imaginary Oduduwa Republic rages on in the South west.

“We cannot of course ignore the long running agitation and violence often leading to piracy, kidnapping and sundry other violent social turbulence in the South South, otherwise known as the Niger Delta,” he added.

Unfortunately, he said, in the present circumstances, it is often difficult to envision the existence of any government credibly committed to the maintenance of law and order in any part of Nigeria.

“It is as if whatever order there may be is observed in the breach: with unknown gunmen, cattle rustlers, kidnappers and armed robbers ruling the highways – from Kaduna to Abuja, Lagos to Onitsha through Benin, and often from Benin, through Auchi to Abuja. Zamfara, Niger, Kebbi and even Kaduna states are no go areas sometimes.

“Add to all these the bombing of the Kaduna – Abuja train and the bandit’s takeover of the Kaduna Airport. It is a state of woe and inexplicable mayhem,” he lamented.

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According to the renowned scholar, it is in the midst of the raging chaos that government is still expected to conduct a national census and a general election.

“The pursuit of these national duties will test and challenge our nationhood. If this sounds like an epistle from hell, it is difficult to deny these as our present reality,” he said.

Anya said the most critical of all crises that assail Nigeria under the current government is the economy.

According to him, the mismanagement of the economy is the central driver of all the other problems particularly the deteriorating security problem.

“It is the state of the economy that has spawned a multitude of other related and interwoven problems such as poverty in which we have become, with India, the poverty capital of the world.”

Anya opined that unemployment, which is at over 40% of the population, is a central factor in driving youth restlessness often culminating in a variety of anti-social attitudes that spawn cultism, drug addiction and abuse, and other social vices including deviant sexual behaviour.

“Our government’s inability to cope with the challenges of the economy arises from the incapacity of our government to apprehend the structural characteristics of a growing economy that determine, if understood and managed properly, can lead to fast paced economic development as has happened to many countries around the world in the last 50 years and most spectacularly with the South East Asian nations,” he said.

For Nigeria to escape this malady, Anya posited that Nigeria requires a minimum GDP growth rate of 11% GDP growth p/a, sustained for a decade or more in view of the present quagmire of underdevelopment driven by poverty especially with population growth rate of nearly 4%.

He added that a firm commitment to education driven science, technology, engineering, mathematics and innovation (STEM) system is basic to all Nigerian plans.

“If this goal is pursued relentlessly productivity will rise as poverty progressively declines, our terms of trade will change positively, while wealth creation will become a constant feature of the economy. Under such circumstances, the exchange rate will appreciate as unemployment will depreciate, “ he said.

Unfortunately, he said Nigeria’s inability to embrace this basic principle of economics has consigned the country to the lowly status of drawers of water and hewers of wood of the world economy.

On how leadership crisis has imperiled the country and accounts for the sorry state of affairs, he said, “We have lacked leaders who would practice statecraft – the art of government with a touch of statesmanship,” noting that the country is in search of a statesman to steer it clear from sinking.

He pointed out that the Nigerian species of politicians is one of the most venal “but thankfully a new crop of putative statesmen have started to emerge from amongst them. It should be noted, however, that the role of the statesman flourishes in a milieu that encourages the growth of patriotism – the feeling of love, devotion and sense of attachment to one’s country.

“So the dilemma that faces us revolves on how to build the bridge of cooperation between the statesman of integrity and the patriotic citizen both of whom are vital for economic development and nation building.”

He enthused that as the country braces for the 2023 election to produce a new president, leadership is key if the country will solve its problems.

“Unfortunately, the present crop of politicians is incapable of solving any of the problems they created and which afflict our society presently. Indeed, it should be obvious that many of the problems were created by the kind and style of politics we practice.

“It is trite logic to observe that a given set of problems cannot usually be solved by those who created them. That is the current dilemma facing the nation. The leadership we need must be driven by knowledge, capacity and integrity. The last value is critical because it is anchored on the value system of the society.”

He said with regard to the economy, Nigeria would need to return governance and the management of the economy to people by instituting “ a process through which the overall education, wellbeing, health, income and living standards of the general population improves such that the economy will grow through enhanced productivity of the people, change through the harnessing of their skills and knowledge. Ultimately the objective is to transform the economy so that we can join the ranks of the developed world. “

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