One can argue that every political decision made by President Bola Tinubu in the last one year or two, has been a response to the lessons from the 2015 electoral defeat of President Goodluck Jonathan.
Whatever the Jonathan government did in terms of the managing the electoral process, starting with the electoral law, accommodating opposition parties and their activities, and even the relative independence of state governments; the present APC government has done the direct opposite.
From all appearances, Tinubu has had time to think about every last detail from the appointment of the chairman of the electoral commission, the Inspector General of Police, the law guiding the appointment of the IGP and even the independence of the National Assembly and the participation of other stakeholders in drafting the electoral laws.
But like every perfect plan, there is always a blind spot.
So it is with preparations for presidential elections or in the strategy to engineer predetermined outcomes.
Or maybe it was Jonathan that didn’t start making plans for his re-election early enough.
And by the time the Office of the National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, chose to intervene in the management of the 2015 presidential election, it was too late.
The election had already been won and lost.
Only, the presidency of Goodluck Jonathan was in denial about it.
To the chagrin of the ruling People’s Democratic Party, the Independent National Electoral Commission had registered a new political party a year earlier.
It was a coalition of opposition parties.
It wasn’t simply that PDP and presidential strategists had been caught off guard, INEC had also shown its hand.
And until the very last minute, the presidency thought the election could still be salvaged.
The presidential election was scheduled for February 14, 2015.
Ten day earlier, Dasuki had written to the INEC requesting a six-week postponement of the election citing the insurgency in Borno, Yobe, Adamawa and Gombe.
The service chiefs and intelligence agencies claimed they could not secure the country for the safe conduct of the election.
And on February 8, INEC chairman, Attahiru Jega announced a six-week postponement of the election.
The new date eventually arrived and after voters had gone to their respective polling stations, their votes counted and collated, there was a last ditch effort to stop the announcement of the results by the security establishment.
But from within, the security agencies were not all on the same page.
Suleiman Abba, who was the Inspector General of Police, was the one that scuttled the efforts disrupt the declaration of Muhammadu Buhari as the eventual winner.
It took just one person.
Nuhu Ribadu is not waiting till the last minute.
His purview as National Security Adviser to President Tinubu encompasses all forms of political activities.
This political brief goes all the way back to the beginning of the Tinubu presidency.
Ribadu was at the heart of foiling the confirmation of Nasir el Rufai, a former governor of Kaduna as a minister in the Tinubu government.
Ribadu was also at the forefront of challenging the smooth dethronement of Aminu Ado Beyero as Emir of Kano, a move believed to have been orchestrated by Rabiu Kwankwaso, a former governor of Kano.
The whole world can, today, see why it was important to stop Kwankwaso from establishing himself as the one and only godfather of Kano politics.
The same can be said about giving el Rufai the space within the government to become the inheritor of Buhari’s legacy.
Coincidentally, both el-Rufai and Kwankwaso are today some of Tinubu’s biggest critics and political adversaries.
While Kwankwaso has seen his hold on Kano loosened after Governor Abba Yusuf, his one-time protege join Tinubu’s political family; el-Rufai has been detained and put on trial for mismanaging public funds.
Yet, their political standing, at least with the masses, only appears undiminished.
Both Attahiru Jega and Suleiman Abba had sworn oaths of loyalty to the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the institutions they presided over.
But as political appointees, should they have directed their loyalties first and foremost to Jonathan?
It is a problem every head of a public institution in Nigeria, and maybe all of the third world faces at one point in their careers.
Most choose loyalty to the president at the expense of justice, the rule of law, transparency and democratic principles.
It was a dilemma Mike Pence, the Vice President of the United States of America faced in 2021 when is boss lost the presidential election then asked him not to validate the election results in a procedural congressional ceremony.
Pence along with other members of the president’s party saw the congressional vote as a constitutional responsibility. Loyalty to the president was secondary.
But Jega and Abba weren’t the only ones to have put the country first and turn their backs on the president.
The then national chairman of the PDP Adamu Mu’azu, also a former governor threatened to concede the election on behalf of the party.
It is hard to say whether Tinubu had planned most of his political moves in advance and before ascending the presidency
Mu’azu had emerged party chairman after Bamanga Tukur had been forced out by PDP governors for aligning too closely with the president.
It hasn’t only been insinuated; there are outright assessments that Jonathan lost because he placed northern personalities in sensitive positions like INEC, the Police and in the party leadership.
Never mind that Dasuki had to spend years in detention after PDP lost the election.
But support for Jonathan in the south was also not rock solid, particularly in Jonathan’s home state of Bayelsa and in Rivers.
The governor of Rivers, Rotimi Amaechi, along with five other state governors from Kano, Kwara, Adamawa and Sokoto also turned their backs on him and the PDP by decamping to the newly registered APC.
It is hard to say whether Tinubu had planned most of his political moves in advance and before ascending the presidency.
But two years after he became president and made Abdullahi Ganduje national chairman of the APC, Tinubu replaced him with Nentawe Yilwatda.
No state governor had a say in nominating the APC chairman.
But a clear pattern has emerged under Tinubu.
Whenever he has felt compelled to appoint a northern candidate to a sensitive position, he has avoided nominating one from the two politically dominant zones.
It was the case with the INEC chairman, the party chairman and the Chief of Army Staff.
These are all signs of the high level of distrust that the president has for the schemings in the regions when it comes to governance and in politics.
It is supposedly to guard against betrayals.
It is not unique to Tinubu.
Heading towards a re-election bid, President Olusegun Obasanjo appointed Tafa Balogun as Inspector General of Police in 2002.
Balogun had worked in virtually every region of the country from the southwest to the southeast.
From the south to the north. In that sense, he knew Nigeria like the back of his hand.
In fact, he was famous, almost a celebrity in Kano.
Tinubu, it seems, believes understanding the whole country is not an asset for nominees, when making these appointments.
That in itself creates a blind spot and is the easiest way to misread local events and respond in the most appropriate way.
This thinking shows in the appointment of Tunji Disu as IGP.
There are other similar appointments all across and within each security agency.
At the same time that the trust issue is surfacing, the presidency is relying on the same people they distrust to deliver the election at the ward, local government and state levels.
Increasingly, Nigerians believe that the next election is really a contest between the opposition and the electoral commission
So rather than have state governors sabotage his re-election bid, at the last minute, by joining forces with the opposition, the Tinubu presidency preempted such moves by cajoling virtually all the state governors into joining the ruling APC, a move that collectively weakens them and leaves them at his mercy.
While paying lip service to the process of amending the constitution and pave the way for the creation of state police, the presidency has slow-walked the process.
The government also midwifed the drafting of the electoral law.
Instead of registering new political parties, which INEC has been reluctant to do, the government has found ways to sabotage existing opposition parties.
But all of these do not mean the APC has a fool proof plan to ensure President Tinubu is re-elected.
For one, not all the governors joining the party are completely at home in it.
Their loyalty to the president cannot also be taken for granted.
Yet, the party machinery at the state level has been handed over to some governors who only months, or even weeks ago were members of the opposition.
Lessons from Nyesom Wike suggest they can do a lot of harm from within the party, especially if the presidency denies them total control in picking candidates for the general elections.
Then there is INEC.
Increasingly, Nigerians believe that the next election is really a contest between the opposition and the electoral commission.
This is because to the missteps from the leadership of INEC.
Rather than act as an umpire, it is coming across as a participant in the contest, eroding confidence and the legitimacy of the entire process.
The suppression of opposition forces and the defection of state governors to the APC only yesterday made the party look like it couldn’t be defeated at the polls.
Now it’s looking very insecure.
Its grand strategy is becoming a liability.
And therein lies the real blind spot. It has discounted the electorate as the ultimate deciders of elections.
