By Emmanuel Obe

Not many commentators might understand what goes on behind the scene in politics and so may never really appreciate decisions arrived at by major political actors. Unfortunately, such actors are not bound to explain the reason behind their rather unusual decisions to their friends and followers. It happens all the time in politics.

So I can understand what former President Goodluck Jonathan is passing through now with the deluge of reactions to his decision to defect to the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, and pick up a nomination form to run for President in next year's general elections.

The truth however is that his decision to run against the position of millions of his supporters willl definitely not end up well for him. It has always been so for people who run against their own will in deference to what had been presented to them as a rather altruistic motive to change their course. It is usually a bait, which once taken leads to death or irreversible destruction.

Jonathan may have been told, as I have read in some publications, that he is a godsend, that his intervention at this time of the political situation of Nigeria is a patriotic call, which he must answer because he appears to be the only one that can restore the nation from the ominous political and economic crash. 

It swells the head to think that as presented by those lobbying you to step into the arena see you as the only one, the only hope of the nation. At that point whatever anyone else says to you just enters through one ear and spirits out through the other ear. This is the most appointed time, one would think, to die for one's nation. Any other thought is of the devil. But it's not a step of fate, not even of faith but of death.

When General Ibrahim Babangida decided to annul the June 12, 1993 presidential election won by the late Chief Moshood Abiola, he did it because a lobby group had impressed on him to do so. But he would not expose them. He could only say if Abiola was allowed to be inaugurated, they would kill him. 

Till date, Babangida bears that burden alone. Within two months, he was forced to step aside as military president in a most shameful manner. He lost the opportunity to be the most celebrated Nigerian leader after drawing up well tested and celebrated political programmes and structures. He was lucky to have escaped with his life. But 30 years after, he still cannot lift his head with pride to say, "Yes. I did it". Arthur Nzeribe, one of those who goaded him on, died during week, unsung in a wheelchair, where Babangida is rooted today.

Abiola himself also gave in to them. After declaring himself President, he allowed himself to be arrested after his goaders said, "Nothing will happen." He had also listened to some international lobbyists a few years later to meet in the office of a sitting head of state where he has insisted on his mandate as the duly elected President of Nigeria. They killed him with a cup of coffee.

When Ken Saro-Wiwa broke his vow not to participate in government arranged conferences and political programmes, it was not his will to do so. He had caved in to international lobbyists, who argued that the only way to change things the way he wanted was to participate in the national constitutional conference of 1994.

I know this because he told me that he was to  be in London as a guest of Channel 4 to talk on environment issues and the Ogoni cause on the day he was arrested in Nigeria on a false charge of killing some of kinsmen. 

He had shelved his appointments with Channel 4 to enable him campaign for the election to the constitutional conference even after MOSOP, the group he led had vowed not to participate in Nigeria government organised elections until the demands of the Ogoni were adequately addressed. He relaxed his guards by subjecting himself to their processes and they set him up. The rest is history. He was hanged with eight of his supporters and compatriots.

Charles Taylor was the President of Liberia, who came to power from rebel lines. He looked a little stubborn to the forces that ruled the western world. They used President Olusegun Obasanjo to lobby him to step out of office and take assylum in Nigeria, that nothing would happen to him. He believed Obasanjo and swallowed the bait. After a few years, the same Obasanjo set him up for arrest and he was taken prisoner to the Hague and tried for war crimes.

I do not know why they want Jonathan down. I also do not know if he knows that the ultimate aim is to rubbish him to prove a point that nothing noble can come from anywhere else  other than the land of those who control the ultimate politics. Despite himself, his image and stature has been growing globally. Now they want to cut him down. 

Maybe they must have approached him to shed some of his views on international issues (he criminalised same-sex marriage in Nigeria), or maybe the issues are localised in Nigeria. They got Nelson Mandela to shed his radical traits and demands for the Black majority in South Africa. He even had to disown his own supporters and family members and ruled moderately over South Africa. That's why they celebrated him, quite strange for a Black nationalist to gain such pleasant wild acceptance among their oppressors.

Jonathan should have died on the side of his people rather than on the side of their oppressors. By dying on the side of their oppressors, he and his people lose and the mission that propelled him will also be lost because the aim was not to achieve that mission but to get him out of the way and sustain the repression and the system that has made his people remain on the ground, held down.

Or could it be that Jonathan was responding to a blackmail? Is there anything they have on him that is not public knowledge? He should watch his steps. It might just be a kiss of death.


Obe of the Street Journalist can be reached on koteobeeleme@gmail.com