BUHUMP – A TALE OF TWO FLOUNDERING PRESIDENTS

President Muhammadu Buhari and Donald Trump will be remembered for the wrong reasons. Buhari
ordered the slaughter of flag waving, anthem singing, protesting Nigerian youths at the Lekki tollgate.
Trump strutted, pouring scorn on voices of reason, while COVID-19 ravished America, claiming more
than 200,000 American lives.
Buhari was ushered in on the promise of CHANGE, many Nigerians jumped in on the bandwagon; we
failed to ask:” Change in which direction?” After five years Buhari and his All Progressive Congress (APC)
party are driving Nigeria into extinction.
Four years ago Trump promised to make “America Great Again”, his brash, take-no-hostage demeanor
found many lovers. Sadly, many of those did not survive the consequence of their choice at the polls.
Americans have yielded to Bernie Sanders’ plea in April to, “come together to defeat the most
dangerous president in modern history”. Joe Biden has won convincingly, Trump as projected has
discredited the process, attempting to stripe bare one of America’s most cherished values, the sanctity
of the people’s will.
Former President Barack Obama said of Trump’s decision not to concede defeat: “We’re not above the
rules, we’re not above the law, that’s the essence of our democracy.
“ I think we were in a circumstance in this election in which certain norms, certain institutional values,
that are so extraordinarily important, had been breached. That it was important for me, as somebody
who had served in that office, to simply let people know ‘This is not normal.’”
What is not normal in America is the norm in Nigeria. While Obama laments about “certain institutional
values, that are extraordinarily important being breached, in Nigeria those institutions no longer exist.
They have since been replaced by “extraordinarily important” individuals who are the law and are above
law. They define the essence of our diluted democracy.
How Trump would have loved to be president of the United States of America with Nigerian institutions.
Then, he would have an army chief-of-staff and his soldiers, whose oath of allegiance is to the president
and not the constitution or country.
Instead, Trump has the misfortune of dealing with a military that, “are unique among militaries”, who “
do not take an oath to a king or a queen, a tyrant or a dictator”.
No matter the damage Trump has done to American institutions (recently he fired defence secretary,
Mark Esper with a tweet) and will do in his last two months, Biden has four years to heal America.
For Nigerians, there is no quick escape in sight. A feeble attempt to oust the incompetent Buhari regime
in 2019 was scuttled by political apathy, electoral fraud and a conniving Supreme Court.
Nigerians have over two years to endure the ghoulish theatre Buhari and his regime has made of Africa’s
most populous country. The government continue to hound protesters while fating kidnappers, bandits
and terrorists.
Our soldiers have abandoned their primary duty of securing the country from external aggression,
instead they have found soft targets in their compatriots and unarmed civilians.

Nigeria continue to sink under the weight of debt servicing and corruption. How many more of my
compatriots will die from pestilence, hunger, and bullets before 29 May 2023? In a country blessed with
some of the greatest optimists that ever walked the earth, depression and suicide are on the increase.
But still we must hope. We must put aside our differences, come together and elect a new set of leaders
who have shown vision, competence, and empathy in public or private service. The time starts now.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect
the opinions of www.aroundtheregions.com)
About the Author

I am Soni Gold, a student of history and lover of humanity.
I am passionate about the Nigerian project that seeks to birth a nation where every Nigerian is
equal before the law and the vast resources of the country are available and accessible to all.
It’s this desire to put my voice and pen where my heart is that led me to the London School of
Journalism.
In the coming weeks and months, you will be reading factual, undiluted accounts of the heart
wrenching Nigerian narrative.
History unlearned they say is history repeated. It is my candid hope that this effort and those of
several other patriotic Nigerians will galvanize my compatriots everywhere around the world to
say: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.