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Yar’adua: Man Of The Year

Author: Michael John | Published:Wednesday, January 6th, 2010

Happy New Year! It sounded so far away in the nineties but now here we are. Ten years into the new millennium and we are yet to realise all the bogus promises of the 90’s. I am sure you remember them: “Food For All By The Year 2000”; “Shelter For All By The Year 2000”; “Health For All By The Year 2000”; “Education For All By The Year 2000”…. To which my friends used to add “Wives And Husbands For All By The Year 2000.”

Ten years past the mark (2000), health is in a worse state of crisis than it was in the last millennium. More vagrants still stoop under Lagos bridges to have “roofs over their heads.” Education, except in Akwa Ibom where it is free, is still a patrician luxury. And in case you are not aware, wives and husbands are still tougher to come by than dog meat in a five-star hotel.

And with just a few weeks to cross over into the magic year of 2010, the darling wife of the man who coined the “Health For All By The Year 2000 ” passed on. Hajia Maryam Ibrahim Babangida, pretty and delectable; a First Lady who stayed in the limelight and somehow managed not to be swayed by the storms of controversy which dogged her husband’s every step. We condole the Babangida family for this loss of a jewel of inestimable value and a great specimen of virtue.

Howbeit, to those who are fond of symbols, that she passed on peacefully abroad, must have been a sad reminder that, not only is health not for all in Nigeria; but it is not even for the rich and powerful. They all have to go abroad when the going gets tough.

But what a lovely dame, Maryam was! As a matter-of-fact, she never put a foot wrong and never said a word amiss. Death is not a democrat and does not allow people to vote on who is no more needed and who is needed. Otherwise, we would have voted consistently for Maryam to stay on and bade some others farewell.

Of course we want President Yar’Adua to stay on. He was not part of the fraud known as “Everything For All By The Year 2000.” He, perhaps, like the rest of us, wondered how we could arrive at this magic year (2000) when all connecting roads led to poverty, illiteracy and poor health. So we should not blame him for taking a trip to Saudi Arabia and not depending on our health facilities at home. And we should also thank him for not coming up with a scheme like “Chewing Gum For All By The Year…” and setting a timetable for it. My skeptical grand daddy always stated that setting a timetable in Nigeria is like setting an examination in a nuthouse. No wonder dear President Yar’Adua set a Seven-point agenda, not a timetable. An agenda is acceptable in a nuthouse.

However, this column has decided to award him our “Man Of The Year.” He is the best president Nigeria has never had. Well to explain that a little, he has been sworn-in as president, but he is never there. He is more like a President-at-large. And even when he is in Nigeria, we seldom feel his presence – except when he is shaking hands with militants and on a few other such occasions.

His achievements are many. He is the least heard president and head of state Nigeria has ever had. And when you consider that his predecessor was the most garrulous president we ever had, you would appreciate our relief at his only being seen and seldom being heard. Whereas Olusegun Obasanjo pretended to have a solution to every problem, Yar’Adua has an uncanny ability to bring up a new problem whenever the last one is solved. That way, we Nigerians always have something to talk about… and this keeps away rust from the moveable part of our brains.

And what is more, the gentleman still has a lot of supporters, including me. We do not mind his being sick and we would not mind if he had one hand and half a brain. Better to have a saintly fool for president than an evil genius. But do not tell my daughter.

My daughter is a great fan of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua. Every night, she gets on her tiny knees in a most reverend manner and begins to recite the alphabets from “A” to “Z.” I once asked her what, nay, who she was doing that for, and she told me she was praying for the President. I wondered why she was doing that by reciting the alphabets and she replied that only God knows what the President was sick of and she was providing God with the alphabets so that he would use them to form the right words and heal him. I feigned understanding and urged her to continue.

Last week she asked me whether the President has a Bible. I replied that I did not know. She said she was going to send him a Bible so that he can read it alongside his Koran. I shrugged. She picked her old Bible and parceled it well. She asked me to take her to the Post Office and I obliged her. The gentleman in the Post Office asked her whether there was anything breakable in the parcel.

She thought about it for a while, then said, “The only breakable thing there is the Ten Commandments.”

I thought about it and came to the conclusion that the problem with our country is that we have been breaking the Ten Commandments too many times and too often. When we returned home she excitedly told the mum that she had sent a bible to the President. Then she asked her whether she had the president’s phone number so that she could call him and find out whether he had received the letter.

She doesn’t know why some people would be wicked enough to canvass for the president to leave office. “My headmaster was sick for a long time and he still came back to school when he was well,” she says and indignantly adds that sickness is not a choice. “Dad,” she added, “we do not have Good Samaritans in Nigeria.”

I grunted as you would have done if you were me.