Run, Jonathan run!
Run, Jonathan run!
With barely 18 months to the 2027 general elections, a wide range of permutations and jostling for which contestant will win which elective office, has cascaded into an overdrive. In a situation that is months ahead of regulation time for campaigns, the polity is already charged with a convolution of permutations, schemes and alignments of sundry political interests, as well as actors comprising strange and familiar bedfellows.
Among these is one trending permutation that concerns the prospects of drafting former President Goodluck Jonathan into another race for the presidency come 2027. Given the Nigerian political terrain where perception easily trumps reality and permutations range from the mundane to the bizarre and the valid, the mention of Goodluck Jonathan in any of such easily attracts significant attention, even as it requires deeper reflection to digest, for many reasons.
One of the reasons is the motive behind any such permutation – that is if such is altruistic and patriotic or simply based on furthering narrow, as well as personal interests. In many instances, the latter not only trumps the former but actually defines the course of the country’s political direction to serve less than the common weal. Another reason is the gentleman’s disposition towards the contemporary state of affairs in the politics of the country as to allow himself get dragged into a business he may not currently be disposed to. Another is the expected impact of his return to the race (if indeed he does), given the much-transformed political terrain of the country with the passage of time since 2015 when he left office.
To help this conversation, it needs to be recalled that Goodluck Jonathan came to power as president not through any ‘fight to finish’ but through endearing himself at different times and situations to the powers that were as a level-headed gentleman who would not mismanage power if entrusted with such. This was the trait the saw him rise from the position of deputy governor of Bayelsa State in 1999 to governor in 2005, then to vice president in 2007 and eventually, to president between 2010 and 2015; a period which countless Nigerians recall today as the golden era of Nigeria’s politics. It was also for that reason that since he vacated office in 2015, he has been enjoying significant goodwill on the global stage, with receiving several awards for contributing positively to global peace, and engaging in countless diplomatic missions to intervene in elections, as well as sundry thorny political processes in other countries. Hence to draft, as it were, such a personality into running again for the office of Nigeria’s president and after 10 years of vacating it, as well as under a different political milieu, is the main issue under consideration here.
It is not unlikely that some proponents of his return may draw parallels with the cases of former presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and the late Muhamadu Buhari, who successfully returned from past stints as heads of state to enjoy two terms each as elected presidents. Yet, their circumstances differ significantly from Jonathan’s. In this context, it needs to be appreciated that given the unique character of the country, with its majority-minority calculus, the choice of a president for Nigeria – even in the days of coup detat and military incursions into governance – runs on negotiations, featuring sharply defined national interests, as much as such foster broad-based consensus.
At the time of this piece, the advocacy for Jonathan’s return is yet to establish his name as one of the strong pillars of that consensus. With the foregoing as a backdrop, the justification for him to run depends on how far the advocacy for his return establishes him as a core feature of that national consensus.
With respect to the advocacy for Jonathan’s return, it needs to be considered that in Nigeria, successful anticipation of future outcomes of political tendencies and permutations depends on a judicious reading of what pundits say along with what the extant operational processes and procedures, as well as the proclivities of the human operatives in the system allow. Bereft of strict adherence to procedural standards and scant compliance with the rules of engagement, outcomes can be quite unpredictable. Putting it otherwise is reading the difference between the actual and expectations, as in this country, such differences can be substantial, and have led many projections on Nigeria’s politics in the wrong direction, just like betting on the outcome of a football match with shifting goalposts and an out of form football itself.
In the light of the foregoing, the question is whether the advocates of Jonathan’s return have lifted their enterprise beyond conscripting the gentleman as a dispensable pawn in a questionable political chess game which offers yet to be discernible positive dividends to him nor his part of the country – the South-South where he is beloved.
In the absence of such a dispensation, all he has to do is run, not for the presidency but against any half-baked advocacy that may serve as a reducing agent to his hard-won veneration at home and rising global esteem.
