No matter where and whenever the history of this colonially named nation known as Nigeria is written, the Olusegun Obasanjo phenomenon will undoubtedly be included in a prominent chapter. He ruled this large nation both militarily and civilianly.
He is a sui generis rabble-rouser in the history of public service in the country because of his renowned mischievous behavior, acts and inactions, and self-centered attitude.
Millions of politically astute citizens thought Obasanjo’s assessment of himself was inflated, but while in power, he felt he understood it all. Even when he is not in charge, he still thinks the people running the state are inept, dishonest, and confused. As the first president of Nigeria’s ongoing democratic experiment, Obasanjo’s uncontrollable pettiness, hubris, and greedy approach to governing are responsible for this, if it is true, particularly since the start of the 1999 democratic dispensation.
Deludingly, all verdicts are inappropriate except Obasanjo’s. It is understandable why he makes every effort to avoid answering inquiries about his third-term agenda, which is a secret. Obasanjo’s lackluster credibility is still marred by the multiple concrete evidence of hundreds of millions of naira being used by point-men in the former president’s administration to bribe members of the National Assembly. In fact, some former members of the National Assembly frequently acknowledged that they had obtained the slush money intended to entice them because they detested Obasanjo’s falsehoods. Obasanjo’s guilt, as his greatest tormentor, causes him to experience nightmare anxiety despite his best efforts to make his public denials matter.
If not, how else would one characterize Obasanjo’s recent warning to African leaders not to pursue term extension in their nations? Regretfully, he is still unquestionably the continent’s most famous architect of unsuccessful tenure extension.
What Obasanjo allegedly remarked during a Democracy Dialogue recently held in Accra, Ghana, by the Goodluck Jonathan Foundation, is read with disdain by yours me. In the latter stages of his second term as president of Nigeria, he was reported to have shamelessly denied the open hidden truth that he desired tenure elongation, sometimes known as the Third Term Agenda.
His questionable denial: “I’m not a fool. I would know what to do if I desired a third term. And no Nigerian, living or dead, would claim that they phoned him and expressed their desire for a third term. Even though his close friends as president and the party that put him in power, the PDP, were actively involved in the promotion of the controversial proposal, he allegedly stated that he valued the debt relief he had successfully won for the nation more than any Third Term Agenda.
The fact that Obasanjo challenges any “living or dead Nigerian” reveals his nightmare mindset because he is aware that most people who are aware of that vile agenda hardly ever take him seriously when he speaks incoherently about that disastrous idea.
When Obasanjo allegedly said at the event that any belief in “one’s indispensability” is a “sin against God,” he was at his most disingenuous. The fact that he played God, wanted, and planned his disastrous Third Term nonsense is something that everyone at the dialogue—including our own esteemed Catholic Bishop, Mathew Hassan Kukah—forgot to inform him of.
Isn’t it dishonorable and misleading for the organizers of such a significant democratic discussion to have invited an Obasanjo who, during his time as president, never concealed his contempt for democratic principles? During his two eight-year stints as president, Obasanjo oversaw a civilian administration that shown the highest disdain for democratic principles.
Obasanjo showed little respect for the traditional or constitutional institutions of state. With Obasanjo’s approval and presidentially interpreted body language, the nation witnessed the worst electoral violations during the tenure of Professor Maurice Iwu as chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). Even the late President Umaru Yar’Adua, who succeeded Obasanjo, acknowledged in public the flaws in the well-run election that put him in power.
Electioneering and political rascality, ballot stuffing, election figure fabrication and falsification, political party imposition, and other anti-democratic practices were common and evidently escalated throughout Obasanjo’s tenure in office.
To his dismay, Nigeria continues to exist despite Obasanjo’s actions as though it would cease to exist without him. He orchestrated the overthrow of multiple Senate presidents and proclaimed states in crisis when their governors refused to follow his autocratic directives: Ahmadu Alli, the national chairman of the People’s Democratic Party at the time, openly announced that the PDP would govern Nigeria for the next 60 years during the height of Obasanjo’s autocratic authority.
However, God stepped in, and by 2015, a group of national opposition parties had united to overthrow the naive and arrogant PDP, just as the National Assembly had cut short Obasanjo’s Third Term Agenda in 2006.
I chose to use Wikipedia in an attempt to uncover the suppressed suffering that General Obasanjo has been experiencing over his abandoned Third Term Agenda, which he makes every effort to deny. From there, a key insight about the horror that Nigeria’s former military-turned-civilian ruler is currently dealing with was provided. “A nightmare is a dream that is frequently associated with unresolved anxiety and trauma that our brain has not fully worked through,” according to Wikipedia. Additional investigation elsewhere indicated that Obasanjo’s dreams concerning his unsuccessful attempt for a third term may be the result of his “unmet psychological demands and/or frustration.
Nightmares are “dreams that are often connected to unresolved anxiety and trauma that our brain has not fully worked through,” according to psychiatrist Jacky Casumbal. Obasanjo’s failing Third Term goal is nicely captured by Justin Alcala’s evocative phrase of “dissatisfied reality,” which must have been haunting him every day as he woke up from his slumber.
This is further simplified by Megan Chance in her book The Spiritualist, where she claims that people like Obasanjo have nightmares because they “run from what they feel” and that the only way to escape the madness that denial causes them is to “own up to their misgivings.” Due to pride, Obasanjo is unwilling to acknowledge his reservations about his third term.
Avoiding more nightmares over his abandoned Third Term program is the best way to allay Obasanjo’s lingering feelings. This can be accomplished if he publicly faces the challenging realities that come with his dishonest denial of the agenda he covertly fostered but abandoned in the National Assembly’s sacred chambers in 2006.
Instead, Obasanjo has brazenly persisted in using his puerile, dismissive rhetoric whenever inquiries about that troubling period in his leadership history are made. His unwarranted defensiveness and patent lies during these times further undermine his alleged leadership value in Nigeria, Africa, and world politics in general.
Even with the current administration’s commendable decision to reinstate history as a subject in the national curriculum, Obasanjo’s deceit in rejecting his ambition for a third term will not stand the test of time. The capital of Ogun State, Abeokuta, was home to the Balogun of Owu, who did everything in his power to wipe the nation’s political history, particularly the more recent and not-so-recent periods. His administration was responsible for the unnecessary removal of history instruction from the curriculum. For personal gain!
His goal is to evade crucial historical records so that many Nigerians under the age of forty will never be aware of his involvement in the demonization of the late Aare MKO Abiola, the victor of the June 12, 1993, presidential election. His military constituency used his presidential candidacy to appease the resentful South-West Yoruba people, who were deeply hurt by the annulment of the June 12 presidential election and the subsequent plot to remove Abiola, their kinsman, from the face of the planet. He didn’t want the forgetful and historically bereaved Nigerians to know this.
Obasanjo also didn’t want Nigerians to know how he suppressed their democratic aspirations in certain states of the federation, where he oversaw an absurd electoral process that included, among other things, the falsification of election results by Professor Maurice Iwu’s INEC.
Since history is once again taught in schools, students will learn about Obasanjo’s manipulation of democratic institutions and his treatment of the governors of his era as though they were his errand boys. Our students will learn how Obasanjo’s ruthless selection of candidates for office undermined internal democracy within his and other political parties. He also planned the unilateral removal of any governors who defied his self-serving directives while in office.
Obasanjo was less concerned about what other people thought. He permitted electoral heists against well-known candidates running for the nation’s governorship and presidency. As governors of Oyo, Ekiti, Plateau, Bayelsa, Delta, Lagos, and Ogun states in 1999, he tormented Rasheed Ladoja, Ayo Fayose, Joshua Dariye, Diepreye Alamieyesiegha, James Ibori, and Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
He believed that the next step was to completely enslave Nigerians by playing with the infamous notion of staying in power through tenure elongation, just because he accomplished all of these things and nothing changed. His disastrous Third Term agenda was abandoned by Nigerians through their resolute federal lawmakers, led by Senator Ken Nnamani, who was the Senate president at the time. This nightmare still haunts Balogun Obasanjo to this day.
