Nigeria is confronting the threat of a grave political crisis as the deteriorating health of incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari (left), and its potentially dire political implications, are stoking anxiety and tension, writes analyst Michael Gyekye.
Vice President Yemi Osibanjo is acting as President as Buhari stays in London for medical attention – his second medical trip to the UK this year. With his date of return home ‘a puzzle, wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma,’ Nigerian power-brokers and pundits are restive and conducting labyrinthine permutations to ascertain crisis scenarios and appropriate responses. Investor confidence may also soon take a hit.
As keen observers have noted, the threatened political crisis stems largely from the uncertainty over how the political agreement to alternate Presidential power in the country between the north and south, can be respected in the event of President Buhari’s inability to continue in office. This uncertainty is heightened by memories of how that consensus endured severe strain after the death of late President Umaru Yar’Adua, and his succession by President Goodluck Jonathan.
An informal international coalition of eminent political personalities assembled by the United Nations, the Commonwealth, the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), with the blessings of the United States and the European Union, could be tasked to engage and collaborate with Nigerian power-brokers and the political elite, to design an informal Presidential succession roadmap that sustains the north-south power alternation arrangement.
Specifically, this plan would comprise securing an agreement from Vice President Osibanjo to step down as President at the end of the current term should the resignation or demise of President Buhari catapult Osibanjo to the Presidency as the Nigerian Constitution stipulates, and allow a candidate from the north of the country to run for President on his party’s ticket. This would preserve the north-south power swivel arrangement.
Recalling the recent example in Gambia, the looming dangerous political crisis in Nigeria cannot be missed as another important opportunity for a smart and timely international diplomatic response to avert a potentially calamitous setback to democratic development in Africa.
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This week’s Nigeria Symposium for Young and Emerging Leaders (above) was powered by The Future Project, in partnership with National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and YNaija.com.
