Buharimeter: Northernisation policy in key federal appointments, a cause for worry

By Ayo Olukotun -[ Punch Newspaper]  

Buharimeter” is essentially an online monitoring device, created by the Centre for Democracy and Development, to track the implementation of campaign promises made by President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo.

Designed in the mould of “Obamameter”, the platform employs web-based applications complemented by policy and media evaluations as well as on the spot checks of the progress of projects. Although “Buharimeter” is a far from perfect instrument to ensure governmental accountability, it offers a rough and ready mechanism for informing Nigerians about the progress or lack of it made by Buhari and Osinbajo. It is for this reason that one of its most recent reports which informs that, according to a national survey, the administration was perceived as effective on implementing only one campaign promise out of very many must be of interest.

The PUNCH, Wednesday, July 13, 2016, quoted the survey as revealing that 84 per cent of Nigerians sampled gave Buhari an excellent mark on anti-corruption while for 45 other campaign promises including job creation and the state of the Nigerian economy, the ratings are dismal ranging from 22 per cent to 39 per cent. What this suggests is that the administration is perceived as diligent with regard to reversing our scandal-filled history, while remaining inefficient and ineffective concerning many other governance issues. Considering that the government has only been in power for 15 months and buffeted by an extraordinary depletion of oil-based national earnings, analysis of its scorecard must take account of these limitations and therefore remain at best tentative.

Having said that however, it must be pointed out that the latest report from “Buharimeter” gives one cause to worry about the slow pace of implementation of the government’s campaign promises.

To underline the point, the newspapers are filled daily with cries of anguish and frustrations by Nigerians who are tormented by ever dwindling power supply, runaway mark-up in the price of essential services, continuous decay of transport infrastructure as well as the sorry plight of tertiary and basic education.

Before carrying the analysis further however, I digress to enter a short take. One of the most frequently rehearsed accusations against Buhari concerns what has become known in public discourse as a Northernisation policy in key federal appointments. As Prof. Jibrin Ibrahim observed in his Daily Trust column on Monday: “There is no doubt that Buhari has been allocating more top jobs to the north just as Jonathan did to the South-South and South-East”. Ibrahim went on to counsel Buhari to be the President of change by rising above the regionally skewed appointments of his predecessors. It is in this context that a conversation must be initiated ahead of their projected implementation of shenanigans to truncate the seniority system in the appointment of the next Chief Justice of Nigeria.

Ordinarily, since the current Chief Justice of Nigeria, Mahmoud Muhammed, is not due to retire until November when he turns 70, the issue ought not to generate the kind of discussions that one finds in several newspapers. However, considering that Justice Walter Onnoghen from Cross River State is the next ranking Supreme Court judge, the ongoing intrigues as reported recently by the Nigerian Tribune could result in a situation where the South which has never produced a Chief Justice in 28 years could be bypassed in an important governance appointment. As known, Justice Ayo Irekefe was the last Southern Judge to be appointed the CJN in what has been for several reasons and unbroken northern dominated pattern of appointments.

In the evolving discussion, some are even suggesting that an “outsider” should be brought in to succeed Muhammed. To be sure, none of these is unusual in politics; one must warn however that the role of politics should be minimised for offices whose main requirements are seniority and integrity. As Bola Bolawole, a columnist of the Nigerian Tribune argued recently: “Under a Buhari government bristling with unfair treatment of the South in federal appointments, another injustice must not be added to the pile already in place.” I wholeheartedly agree; seniority and merit must be allowed to take their due places.

To go back to the main discourse, countrywide perceptions indicating the worsening plight of Nigerians arising from so far unkept promises of the administration can be illustrated by two recent opinions in our newspapers. The first is a publication in The PUNCH on the OPED page (July 13,2016) entitled, “Mr. President nothing is working oh!” After documenting the many sided woes Nigerians are putting up with, the write-up ended by saying: “Sincerely, Mr President, nothing is working well for most Nigerians who lack access to power and its trappings and waking up to this reality and acting swiftly to avoid more sufferings is your constitutional duty. You asked for it. You must do it faithfully”. The second write-up which corroborates the findings of “Buharimeter” on the desperate and worsening plight of Nigerians comes from the editorial of The Nation of July 13, 2016. Argued the paper: “Apart from food items, kerosene price has soared uncontrollably in recent times with no coherent explanation from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation. A litre which sold for about N100 has doubled to over N200 per litre. Kerosene is the major cooking fuel for majority of the people…”

These depressing narratives and the lukewarm response by government confirm the major finding of “Buharimeter” that while government has probably excelled in its anti-corruption drive, its lopsided character notwithstanding, it has yet to make any appreciable dent on important governance problems such as collapsing infrastructure, soar away prices of goods and job creation. One other area of qualified success not adequately captured by the recent “Buharimeter” is the determined rolling back of the Boko Haram challenge. What is admonished is that Buhari should prosecute the war against hardship and rising unemployment with the same verve with which he has tackled corruption and the Boko Haram challenge. In order to do this successfully, he must make better use of the best and brightest brains and create a system for monitoring the performance of his ministers, not hesitating to shut the door to those who perform below expectation.

Second, he must avoid opening fresh theatres of war or having them opened for him as appears to be the case in the current face-off between the executive and the legislature. As a tested General, he must know how to choose his battles and how to concentrate maximum resources in winning the most important battles while avoiding the distractions and attractions of detours that can only detain him and dilute his focus.

Important, too, is the need to make a clean breast of the urgent need for restructuring the country which he appears to have so far avoided. It was Azuka Onwuka who reminded us in in his column in The PUNCH on Wednesday that the manifesto of the All Progressives Congress contains a pledge to “initiate action to amend our constitution with a view to devolving powers, duties and responsibilities to states and local governments in order to entrench true federalism and the federal spirit”. This amounts to a pledge to restructure and Nigerians demand of him its implementation. No more, no less.