BETWEEN PETER OBI AND ATIKU ABUBAKAR

 Atiku represents a stronger unifying force, reckons Ozi Nwadike

Between Governor Peter Obi and Vice President Atiku Abubakar, it’s one or the other. You can’t have both. Shrug as you may, it’s not an easy choice to make. Let me tell you why.

‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the holy is understanding,’ – Proverbs 9:10, King James Version. As a 32 years old grappling with meaning, my journey has taken me across many philosophies and ideas.

In the last one year or so, Jordan B. Peterson, a Canadian clinical psychologist and professor emeritus at the University of Toronto has caught my keen attention. The New York Times calls him ‘the most influential public intellectual in the world right now’. Though I suspect our views on politics and cultural issues are apart (I identify as a progressive), Peterson, through his books and speeches, offers profound life advice rooted in stoicism, ancient wisdom, psychology, religion and mythology.

His ideas surrounding the meaning of life helps young people to sort out their lives and improve their wellbeing. In one of his talks, Peterson uses the above biblical verse as an analogy to make the point about recognizing the all-powerful nature of reality. The world is not going to bend over for you. The world doesn’t care about your feelings, who are you?

Like how dare you? In other words, to thrive in the world, you have to chin-up and be a man and stop whining like a child. There is no clear path to victory for either Obi or Atiku if both of them are on the ballot come Saturday, 25th February, 2023. I mean this is serious stuff; it’s not microblogging during free time. Obi and Atiku will figuratively self-immolate each other and clear the path for a different candidate.

Our reality is that Nigeria is a complex and an intensely polarized, along tribal and religious lines. You can’t wish it away with childish tantrums especially when your competitor’s strategy is tested and tried – divide and conquer.

As urban middle class young people with access to smartphones and the internet acquire new followers by propping up the effable Mr. Obi’s campaign on social media, you have a sense that it is not tempered with a dose of the ultimate reality of some sort of coalescing at some point with the Atiku campaign.

Governor Obi will face an uphill task to take down the electoral colossus and behemoth that is the All Progressives Congress. Vice President Atiku on the other hand offers a clearer electoral path to victory with a vibrant Obi coalition. Compromises will have to be made.

We cannot allow our passion to become our hubris, no matter what the first-time-in-their-lives political campaigners on social media yammer on about,‘Teacher this woman was caught in adultery’… When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them ‘Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her’….

‘Woman, where are they, has no man condemned you?’ ‘No one Sir’ she said. ‘Then neither do I condemn you’ Jesus declared. ‘Go now and leave your life of sin’ – John 8: 1-11, New International Version. The truth is that Atiku Abubakar’s record has been bastardized. I would concede that it’s also reflective of his failings as a candidate.

This is a man who came from extremely humble background with no name recognition; who attained a law diploma in the 60s; served meritoriously in the Nigeria Customs and employs tens of thousands of people in legitimate businesses across real estate, oil and gas, maritime, agriculture and education; and who drove the wheels of the widely acclaimed golden era of reforms under President Olusegun Obasanjo.

I find it almost shocking that he doesn’t get his due accolades. A true democrat who was hounded and exiled by General Sani Abacha. The protégé of the larger-than-life Shehu Yar’Adua. I agree he needs to better explain himself on allegations of money laundering in the United States of America.

What is not in doubt is that Atiku was a very wealthy businessman before he became Vice President in 1999. Establishing a trust to manage one’s business interests while in political office and wiring monies to one’s wife is not the earth shattering scandal you think it is. I mean even Governor Obi, who is reported to have made his fortune from importation of fast selling goods (to the detriment of Nigerian jobs and factories?) was implicated in the Pandora papers of owning offshore accounts.

I am not absolving Atiku or Obi of any blame. The ideal is that we should always hold our political leaders to the highest ethical standards. The wise prevails through great power, and those who have knowledge muster their strength. Surely you need guidance to wage war and victory is won through many advisers – Proverbs 24: 5-6, New International Version.

Between vice President Atiku and Governor Obi there is mutual respect. Obi refers to him as ‘my leader’. Atiku’s courageous tapping of Obi as his vice President nominee in the 2019 elections, even at the risk of attracting the ire of party bigwigs from the South-East, is continued testament to Atiku’s legendary eye for talent. On policy it is hard to separate the two men, as they both share a vision of a prosperous private sector-led economy.

Though Obi, not minding that he was Governor of Anambra about 10 years ago, surely has a fresher face and comes with less baggage in comparison to the old man Atiku who has survived a dictator; watched his mentor rot and die in jail; the appropriation of his business; and played a significant role in stabilizing the country after military rule in 1999. Atiku’s greatest strengths is also his weakness, hanging over him like the sword of Damocles.

You don’t need a soothsayer to tell you the man is not an ideologue. A man who has run for president multiple times but doesn’t really have a political base. Atiku’s support cuts across all the geo-political zones, tribes, and demographics. He is not going to get wild enthusiastic support like the charismatic outgoing President Buhari but what is clear is that this is a man who his supporters trust to get the job done.

Atiku starts the race as the frontrunner. He has the coalition and a clearer path to victory. At this dire and pivotal time in our history and in country as complex as our with deep rooted schisms, already tethering on the precipice of disintegration, Atiku in my view represents the strongest, unifying, progressive possibility.

 Nwadike is a lawyer and Executive Director of ‘People For Atiku’