By Simon Imobo-Tswam

PDP Presidential candidate, Mr. Umaru Yar'Adua is not at ease. Some political heavyweights are keeping too much silence. Top on the list is former military dictator, General Ibrahim Babangida.

The adage that silence is golden may be a time-honoured truth, but to the extent that its application is neither universal nor unbroken cannot be said to be an absolute truth. This means in some instances, far from being golden, silence can be ominous, if not outright dangerous. And in the build up to the April polls, given their historic geo-political significance, the silence of some political heavy weights, especially those of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) formation, cannot be said to be golden by any stretch of the phrase.

On the contrary, it is the resonance of their speeches that would be golden at this material time of our inexonerable march towards democratic consolidation.

These political heavy-weights include Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, self-confessed evil genius and acclaimed grand master of political puppetry; Prof. Jerry Alhassan Gana, a professor of geography whose gift of the garb, secured him indeterminate tenancy in officialdom beginning from 1985 and Gen. Mohammed Buba Marwa, the suave chairman of Albarka Airlines who shot to national lime-light during his tenancy in Alausa as military administrator of Lagos State under the late Gen. Sani Abacha.

There are also others like Gen. Theophilus Yakubu Danjuma, a billionaire-businessman who once swore that if Obasanjo lost his presidential bid, he would go on exile and chief Alex Ifeanyi Chukwu Ekwueme, the former vice president under Alhaji Shehu Shangari, who at a not too distant period in our history approximated the conscience of the nation.

Of course, there are other political juggernauts like Chief Audu Ogbeh, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu, Chief Solomon Lar, Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, but because these have found shelter in an alternative political party, they do not factor here.

It is the loud silence of men of timbre and caliber, iron and steel, Iroko and mahogany, caterpillar and bull-dozer (apologies to late K. O. Mbadiwe and latter-day copy-cats) like Babangida, Gana, Marwa and Danjuma (who have never renounced their membership of PDP, but are quiet) that make this piece imperative. But of these, Babangida and Gana deserve special attention.

BABANGIDA:

An armoured corps officer who effortlessly edged out his boss, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, in an adroit palace coup in 1985. Babangida is someone who admittedly loves to "dominate" his environment. His openness allows him to court and keep friends of many shades.

And thanks to this dominant trait and openness, Babangida, like Chief Obafemi Awolowo before him, has become the main issue in Nigerian politics. From the late 80s upwards, the question has always been: are you for or against Babangida?

But if he has been the main political issue, he has also been the main man with the most political baggage, baggage generated from his "dominating" role in professional soldiery, and even in active retirement. And talking of excess baggage, there is Mamman Vatsa, OIC, $12bn gulf war oil windfall, Dele Giwa and last, but perhaps most hauntingly the June 12 albatross.

Once described by Africa now as "the soldier's soldier," IBB, as he is fondly called, can also be described as "the politician's politician."

It was arising from the latter principally that Babangida in 1999 joined the band-wagon and, indeed, became the cheer-leader of a special-interest clique which saw that power moved from the North to the South, and specifically to South-Western Nigeria via the political liquidation of Dr. Alex Ifeanyichukwu Ekwueme and Chief Olu Falae.

In 2003, the "king-maker", who had beaten a hasty and inglorious exit from power a decade earlier when he saw history, but refused to make it, made moves to return to power, but the second term aspiration of president Olusegun Obasanjo checked that. In the run off to the 2007 elections, IBB publicized his membership of the PDP with a coded registration number of 007; and followed this up with his purchase of the party's presidential nomination forms.

Like Prof. Gana, Gen. Marwa and Gen. Aliyu Gusau before him, IBB's purchase of nomination forms effectively shattered the plans of PDP governors who made the efforts to turn presidential succession within the party into a "governors' affairs."

But just when Nigerians, were getting ready to see how Babangida, a supposedly deadly power-player, would deploy his famed "Maradonic" moves to great effect and thus overwhelm the governor-aspirants, he withdrew from the race.

Though, as Dr. Chuba Okadigbo of blessed memory, would say, "the right to aspire for political office is the same as the right to withdraw", Babangida's withdrawal raised some questions.

Was he blackmailed by the powers that be with the haunting ghosts from his past to once again step aside or did he do so willingly? An acclaimed master of the power game, did Babangida chicken out when the stark prospects of being demystified by the grand master of the powe-game himself left him stupefied? Was it true that after he truncated the presidential project of Gen. Shehu Musa Yar'Adua (rtd) in 1992, he suddenly remembered the words of Alhaji Musa Yar'Adua, the patriarch of the Yar'Adua dynasty, who counseled him to see Shehu and Umar as brothers and, thus, not compete for advantage with them? Or as some people have suggested, did Babangida perceive the PDP code of conduct issued shortly after he bought the party's nomination forms as targeted against his particular candidature?

Whatever the reason, his sudden and poorly explained withdrawal from the presidential race after over 10 years of painstaking strategizing brought the declaration of Col. Halilu Akilu (rtd), in its recklessness, audacity and naivety, into bold relief.

Akilu, had in a well-publicized interview in the media boasted that "a million Obasanjo's cannot stop IBB." But given the weak, almost sophomoric, reason for his nervous withdrawal, it is plausible that one-Obasanjo afterall (and not a million clones of the Egba General) stopped IBB in his tracks!

But given IBB's earlier statement that he would play an active role in politics, it is not enough that he has lately joined the international diplomatic circuit as a presidential "errand boy". He needs to identify with the scion of the Yar'Adua dynasty, Gov. Umar Yar'Adua. This is moreso if Nigerians are to believe his reasons for withdrawing from the race. To profess to heed the advice of Alhaji Balewa's Lagos affairs minister over collaboration with his sons, but stay away from the campaign project of his son is, to say the least, strange.

Given that Babangida did not congratulate his "brother" when he emerged victorious in the PDP presidential primaries is even stranger; and smocks of a hidden lagenda.

In 1998/99, he made loaded trips to Otta. It is yet early in the day. A trip to nearby Katsina and a goodwill message in Daily Champion will be good pointers.

Prof. Gana:

As one who made a debut on the national political scene in 1983 when against all odds he emerged as a senator of the republic from Niger state (considered even today as the bastion of conservative politics), Gana has not looked back.

Described as Nigeria 's best-known mobilizer, Gana has deployed his speechifying prowess to the service of every government (mostly military) since 1983, either as lawmaker, consultant, chairman, minister, secretary Pastor or adviser.

However, in spite of his staying power in government, this academic-in-government (AIG) has managed to stay clear of the scourge of the Nigerian ruling class i.e. the

disease of primitive accumulation. But his long stay has also transformed this AIG into AGIP i.e. Any government in Power.

But for good or for bad, the nation's best known mobilizer has twice been unable to mobilize Nigerians for his presidential project in a classic case of physician: heal thy self.

Though a holder of a Doctorate in Market Place Economics and the development process, Jerry Gana's "jeje" brand of politics is strangely at variance with Nigerian's market-place politics of 10 dead, 30 injured fame.

But nonetheless, an authority in his area of specialization as Nigeria 's chief mobilizer, Gana has mobilized support, goodwill and membership for the largest party in Africa , and remains the one and only secretary of PDP board of trustees.

Thus like the chairman, PDP board of trustees, Chief Tony Aneni, ought to be gracing PDP campaign rallies, praising Obasanjo's reform agenda, trumpeting its continuity and branding product Yar'Adua.

But for the first time in the last 20 years, there is a gargantuan mobilisational project and Gana's golden voice is silent. And yet his soaring oratory and electrifying speeches, with his trade-mark gesticulations, will enliven, PDP's rallies after President Obasanjo's languid deliveries, Ahmadu Ali's pungent diatribes or even Gov. Yar'Adua's rather cool performances.

His silence is far from golden. When his friend and former Commerce Minister, Alhaji Mustapha Bello, lost out in the tussle for Niger state governorship under the PDP banner, he crossed over to Peoples Redemption Party (PRP).

With Prof. Gana's telling silence, is he as well contemplating party-change?


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