The Need for an Interim Government – By Tochukwu Ezukanma

By Tochukwu Ezukanma  | Lagos, Nigeria | April 29, 2023 – It has been said that there is no provision for an interim government in the Nigerian constitution.  Interestingly, a constitution is never a totally finished product. Thus, it is not static, but dynamic: it continues to evolve. In its dynamism, it adjusts to accommodate constitutional amendments, and judicial elucidations of constitutional lacunas, ambiguities and obscurities. In its elasticity, it also stretches to accommodate emergent traditions, exigencies and emergencies.

The Emi lokan phenomenon – the Bola Ahmed Tinubu overbearing arrogance, bumptious ego, rampaging megalomania and political Neanderthalism – brought a fiendish, frightening dimension to Nigeria politics. The constitution must adjust to accommodate the Emi lokan factor and its attendant ferocious barbarism and pre-stone age crudity that Tinubu brought into the 2023 presidential election. And this might demand an Interim National Government.

Already, with his mammoth wealth, he has demonstrated an alarming penchant for buying every Nigerian, with a price. In our cupid, avaricious and wealth-obsessed society, with the exception of an eccentric few, Nigerians have a price, and are buyable. The Independent National Election Commission (INEC) chairman, Mahmoud Yakubu, was allegedly bought by Tinubu. Not surprisingly, his handling of the 2023 presidential election defied reason, and contravened the law, election guidelines and every moral and ethical standard. It was just too wacky and weird; and could not be justified by any normal yardstick.

The INEC disobeyed its own rules and guidelines. It intentionally sabotaged the BVAs, and deliberated refused to transmit the presidential election results from the polling units directly to the INEC portals, as demanded by its guidelines. In many states, the chief collating officers were bribed and compromised, thus, they jettisoned the real results collated from within the state, and declared fake election results sent in from the INEC office in Abuja,

In Lagos State, Tinubu’s thugs – his private army – were on a brutal, sanguinary rampage. Despite heavy police presence, the thugs intimidated voters, suppressed votes, and carted away ballot boxes in the Labor Party strongholds. They attacked, brutalized, shot at, and in some instances, killed Labor Party members and supporters. Lamentably, the police and other security agencies refused to intervene, and maintain law and order. This was because the police hierarchy and the Divisional Police Officers (DPOs) were bought, and thus, had to strictly adhere to their scripts, as dictated by their APC paymasters. A litany of the complicity of the INEC and the law enforcement officials in the APC/Tinubu rigging of the February 25^th, 2023 presidential election is endless, but beyond the scope of this article.

Despite APC’s thuggery, violence and multitude of electoral crimes, Peter Obi still won the presidential election. Election figures collated from polling units across the country made clear an Obi victory. Lamentably, the INEC chairman, Mamoud Yakubu, announced a fake election result, and declared the loser, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the winner and president-elect. Peter Obi is already in court challenging the stolen mandate. It is extremely important that Tinubu is not sworn in, as the president, till the court process challenging his electoral “victory” is totally exhausted. It will be splendid, if this can be done before May 29^th, 2023. If not, the situation demands an interim government that will steer the affairs of the country till the final resolution of the court case.

The consequences of swearing Tinubu in before the final verdict on the Labor Party presidential election petition will be too dire for the country. It will be tantamount to a bludgeon on Nigerian democracy, and the extolment of all that is wrong with Nigerian politics. It will increase his powers and augment his war-chest, which will enable him, with his do or die quest to retain his stolen mandate, to eviscerate the judicial process. He will intimidate, harass and buy over the judges; and emasculate every institution of government, and intimidate political opponents and independent-minded political observers into submission, or hound them into exile.

Already, he is at hard at work; assiduously laboring to subvert the judicial process in the presidential election petition. He is holding secret meetings with judges, including the Chief Justice of the country, destabilizing Peter Obi’s political party, the Labor Party, and sustaining a campaign of calumny against the presidential and vice presidential candidates of the Labor Party. To forestall the validation of an illegitimate president-elect, total erosion of the independence of the judiciary and the emasculation of the institutional moorings of democracy, Nigeria needs an interim government to steer the affairs of the country till a final resolution of the legal challenge to Tinubu’s electoral “victory.”

Tochukwu Ezukanma writes from Lagos, Nigeria | maciln18@yahoo.com | 0803 529 2908

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