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Now comes the million-dollar question: Why did President Olusegun Obasanjo declare a state of emergency in Plateau State?
Sometimes, it is beneficial to approach this type of poser by tackling the why-nots first. In other words, what weren't his motives for the declaration of the state of emergency in Plateau State? Right away, it is clear that the President did not take this measure on selfish political grounds. That is probably why he is getting away with it, contrary to the heavens-will-fall fears of many whenever the case of emergency rule crops up.
The state of emergency in the old Western Region during the First Republic was problematic because it was perceived as politically motivated and aimed at undermining the authority of Chief Obafemi Awolowo's Action Group (AG) in favour of the pro-Northern People's Congress (NPC) government of the Premier, Chief Samuel Akintola.
It would be seen as a political measure if Obasanjo had introduced it in a state where there are clear political differences between him and the governor or party in power at the state concerned. If it were in Kano, an All Nigerian People's Party (ANPP) state, which was wrested from the People's Democratic Party (PDP), the President would be accused of taking Kano by abuse of emergency powers. It would be easier to mobilise Muslim sentiments against Obasanjo. If it were Anambra State where the President has been exploring all possible avenues to undermine the government of Dr. Chris Ngige for dumping the Chris Uba platform, Obasanjo would be accused of abusing the law for the political aggrandisement of his in-laws. He would be faced with Igbo sentiments. If it were in Lagos State, the only remaining Alliance for Democracy (AD)-controlled state, the President would also come under the accusation of taking the state by bullet where the ballot failed him. And if it were in Delta State, he would be charged with malicious intent against the government of Chief James Ibori, who is said not to have the best of political ties with the President.
In any of these cases, there certainly would have been trouble. It would not have been smooth sailing as the Plateau emergency rule appears to have done. There would have been a stiffer reaction to it in the National Assembly on the one hand, and the locality of the concerned state on the other. Certainly, the committee of governors would not have given it the wholesale support they did. It would have been far more complicated than what we have witnessed in Plateau so far.
It is not political in that President Obasanjo and Governor Joshua Dariye have not at any time been on collision course. Secondly, Plateau is a PDP State. And thirdly, it is a Christian-dominated state. Obasanjo being a Christian himself is better placed than a Muslim President to move against a Christian-dominated state where there is a fracas between Christians and Muslims. At the ethnic level, there is no previous serious political bone of contention between Yoruba and the various groups in Plateau State. If anything, Obasanjo has adopted Plateau and the Middle Belt important personal allies. It would have been a different thing, for instance, if Plateau was an Igbo or Hausa-Fulani state.
With the complication of primordial political motives mainly ruled out, Obasanjo could afford to renege on an agreement he reached with members of the State and National Assembly from Plateau State to allow Governor Dariye to be impeached or forced to resign. We now come back to our initial question: Why did Obasanjo choose Plateau as his guinea pig theatre for experimenting with the state of emergency?
A member of the House of Representatives from Plateau State, Hon. Victor Lar representing Langtang, hit the nail on the head when he observed that Obasanjo chose the emergency option "to create a precedent". Now comes a concomitant question: Why is a precedent important to Obasanjo? The answer is clear. He wants to be able to hit Kano, Kaduna or any other Muslim northern state, whether under ANPP or PDP whenever the bestial tradition of murdering innocent non-Muslim settlers among them is re-enacted.
This much is evident in his decision to write the Sultan of Sokoto and issue a warning to the Governor of Kano State, Alhaji Ibrahim Shekarau. Having successfully started with Plateau, the charge of political motivation will be greatly doused if in the future he has strong grounds to move against the Governor of Kano State as a result of their usual mob attack on non-indigenes..
Obasanjo's strategy resembles a similar recent one adopted by the United States under President Bill Clinton and continued by the government of George W. Bush. In the current politically charged new world order where the Muslim world has adopted terrorism in confronting Western domination of world affairs, Clinton saw an opportunity in the Serbian bloody campaigns against its neighbours, (particularly the republics of Bosnia-Hercegovina and Kosovo, which were part of the old Yugoslavia federation). Serbia is a mainly Christian republic, while their opponents were mainly of the Islamic background. Clinton ordered a massive bombing raid of Serbia, which crippled its capacity to threaten its neighbours. Eventually, the President of Serbia, the fearsome Slobodan Milosevic, was captured and is currently on trial at the international war crimes tribunal.
Sections of the Muslim world, which had been emotionally convinced of America's hidden agenda over its repeated war campaigns against Iraq, were very happy to see the US fighting Serbia to liberate Bosnian and Kosovan Muslims. Having grabbed a great dose of legitimacy through this strategy, the US was thusly well placed to pursue Osama bin Laden into Afghanistan and deposing the Islamic-purist Taliban regime in the process. From there, President Bush became unstoppable in his family's longtime quest to remove President Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. With bin Laden driven underground and Saddam ousted from power, America hopes to assert greater direct influence in the heart of the Islamic world and thus advance its economic and political goals in the region.
In the light of this, it will be myopic for Nigeria's northern Muslims leaders to wax euphoric over the Plateau experience. It is interesting that the who is who in the Muslim political community has praised Obasanjo for declaring emergency rule in Plateau State. These include Obasanjo's otherwise political enemies, such as Alhaji Wada Nas, Abubakar Rimi and a whole lot of others, who would normally create problems for Obasanjo if a similar measure is introduced in any of the Muslim far northern environments. Perhaps, without knowing it, they are playing into Obasanjo's hands and reacting favourably to his tactical objectives. The day the President capitalises on a riot and removes the Governor of Kano State he can point to the Plateau precedent to shrug off any accusation of political motive.
There is no doubt that both Governor Dariye and President Obasanjo have been guilty of avoidable excesses on the Plateau crises. Dariye's was the case of a failed governor. A governor's primary duty is to maintain law and order and to protect the lives and property of all citizens in his state. That is why he is variously described as "the father of the state" and "chief security officer". He is not supposed to take sides with any party to a quarrel, no matter whose ox is gored. When a governor takes sides and becomes aloof to the plight of a section of the community under his jurisdiction, he loses his right to be described in these double-barrels sublime terms.
However, this does not justify President Obasanjo's decision to remove an elected governor and state assembly through unconstitutional and undemocratic means. There is nothing in Section 305, which deals with the issue of emergency rule declaration by the President, which gives him this right. The constitution did not give the President or anyone the power to appoint a sole administrator for a state and arrogate to himself the power to make decrees for the administration of the state.
The real danger in what Obasanjo has done in Plateau State will emerge when he or any of his successors decides to build upon this dangerous precedent, especially if it is construed to be politically motivated.
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