A diplomat and politician during ex-president Obasanjo’s tenure,Ambassador Ibrahim Maisule, has said Nigeria has had enough of the former military and civilian ruler foisting unprepared and ineffectual leadership on the nation. Speaking in a recent interview with VANGUARD, Maisule when asked to assess Nigeria’s democracy, he said,”Nigeria’s democracy is sick. This chronic ill health destroying our democracy springs from the very mistake of the exiting military authorities and their political allies who planted President Olusegun Obasanjo, fresh from prison, in the Presidential villa where he caused more harm than good for eight years.
“Our democracy was undermined by two dangerous factors: Corruption and lack of political party discipline and internal democracy. They also endangered the independence of the legislature in our democracy. Nigerians had high expectations on the advent of our democracy and even greater hopes that it would offer good life and promote culture of good governance in Nigeria.
“But President Obasanjo on the 3rd of June 1999 corrupted the process of electing the leadership of the National Assembly. Money from the Obasanjo Presidency was used to produce the late Senator Evan Enwerem as Senate President against the preferred and popular candidacy of Dr Chuba Okadigbo.
“It was a dangerous precedent. This singular event did the greatest harm to our democracy. It introduced corruption to our democratic polity and undermined political party discipline because President Obasanjo used his Alliance for Democracy (AD) kinsmen and senators from All Peoples Party (APP) to do “coup” in the red chamber. Obasanjo did same harm in the House of Representatives where an unqualified person was elected Speaker Salisu Buhari.
“These were sad developments that indicated early enough that Nigeria’s democracy was endangered. Throughout President Obasanjo’s years, the National Assembly never elected their own leaders except they were approved by the Presidency. Opposition parties were corrupted and left in disarray, while the ruling political party produced new leadership every year. The PDP, the ruling party then, had Chief Solomon Lar, Barnabas Gemade, Audu Ogbeh and Ahmadu Ali as chairmen of PDP within eight years. It was terrible! Obasanjo created a jungle out of Nigeria’s democracy. That is what we are suffering today!”
The post ‘How Obasanjo created a jungle out of Nigeria’ – Ambassador Ibrahim Maisule appeared first on Dawn-To-Dusk News.