Former NEF Spokesperson, Baba-Hamed’s Jitters Over 2027 Presidential Election

If the recent public pronouncement of the former spokesperson of the Northern Elders Forum (NEF), Dr. Hakeem Baba- Hamed, is anything to go by, then it will not be wrong to conclude that the group is angry with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

It alleged that the Nigerian president has not given the group the recognition it deserved.

NEF is grumbling that it is an insult to the elders, who have a large number of obligations to fulfil; huge responsibilities to shoulder, but have been given a small-sized feeding bottle that could not satisfy the pang of hunger ravaging a famished tummy. To the Northern Elders Forum, BAT has fallen their hands, by giving them the short end of the stick.

 

According to the group, Mr. President has disappointed them in terms of expectations of patronage and sharing of offices, and other benefits that could accrue to a group that supported a victorious presidential candidate.

 

They are miffed and are fuming with anger. They didn’t stop at that, they threatened to withdraw their support, which would, to them, certainly jeopardise the second-term ambition of BAT, come 2027.

 

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By their act, they have displayed traits of political jobbers. They are a group, who always look up to the next election. It is a gambit that earns them their living. The difference between them and statesmen is like cheese and chalk. The two are poles apart. Yes, statesmen are bent on the delivery of campaign promises to the people after victory at the poll. They always strive to make the state stand solidly on its feet. The jobbers are nothing but fair-weather friends.

 

What a group with a deep instinct to blackmail and use people as cannon fodder and expendable to achieve their objectives. They regard people as cannon fodder to be exploited, used, and disposed of.

 

Members of the Northern Elders Forum, with the public pronouncement of Dr. Baba- Hamed, are political jobbers, who are out strictly for their benefits and attain their advantages. Despite the fact they currently hold political offices, they are not interested in how to tighten security and end the glaring violent ethnic cleansing in the Middle Belt targeted at usurping the right to land of indigenes of Benue, Plateau and Niger States, raging banditry in Zamfara State and Boko Haram insurgency in the Borno, that are not only kidnapping for ransom, but also sacking farmers on their farmland, and escalating famine in the state.

 

Baba-Hamed and his ilk want a puppet president, who would shiver whenever they sneeze and take orders from them. That was an error of perception on their part. To their disappointment, they found BAT to be a different kind of President. BAT is a President, who has a mind of his own. A man, who has a vision driving his mission in power. A desire to make democracy permanent on the political terrain of Nigeria, serving on a pedestal that expedites development and elevates the standard of living of all and sundry. What a way of delivering a bouquet of democratic goods, values, and dividends to the electorate.

 

Tinubu has resolved to tame the monster of insecurity, bandits-inflicted famine, rescuing the economy from the doldrums, and energizing prostrate dwindling Naira value in the foreign exchange market with appropriate monetary and fiscal policy that would not tolerate any debilitating compromise from any quarters. BAT is focused on ending socio-economic challenges tormenting the people with the programme of Renewed Hope Agenda, and would not allow anything or groups to distract him. That perhaps is why for now, nothing is more important to the president than the welfare of the electorate.

 

The question on the lips of people is what does the forum want to achieve or gain with the threat of withdrawing their support from the BAT come 2027? Dangling the carrot of the 2027 presidential election to induce BAT to dance to the tune and drum beats of the Northern Elders Forum members is considered too early in the calendar of politics and politicking for future elections. Their undiplomatic, subtle harassment that they would rally Northern voters against BAT’s second term sounds brash, puerile, and perhaps on the border of over-estimation of their political clout.

 

They may be surprised that BAT might not be rattled. Are they oblivious to the vagaries of the dynamics that dictate the political pace in the election period, which are subject to changes and oscillate? They might not be the champions of the dominant coalition in the north in 2027 and, therefore, not in any position to be of any relevance and influence on what party and presidential candidate the electorate would vote for.

 

As Baba-Hamed and his group have come into the open to subtly threaten BAT, they have betrayed their loyalty and have proved that they should not be trusted or relied upon despite that they are part of the present federal government.

 

Baba-Hamed is an appointee of the President. The expectation is that he should roll up his sleeves to complement the President’s efforts to overcome challenges that are making life difficult for the people.

 

The election period is gone; the delivery of democratic dividends to the people is what should engage the attention of any political leader who is worth the name. Baba-Hamed’s provocative vituperation has exposed him to be a political jobber, definitely not a statesman. No politician, who has a modicum of goodwill will engage in subtle and disgraceful incitement of the electorate against a sitting government in which he is an official.

 

Political jobbers are mostly like the ancient Roman empire auxiliary soldiers, who can’t be trusted as they could renege on loyalty unannounced when least expected. As a primed grenade that could explode any moment, is a fair-weather politician, a footloose jobber who could wreak havoc on the goodwill of his principal. That, however, makes their momentary noisy distraction a sheer bubble devoid of any potency that could wreak havoc on the principal interest.

 

CREDIT: TheNation Newspaper