LONDON – Flying at 30,000 feet with President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria can be a nerve wracking experience – nothing to do with the pilots from the Nigerian air force. They are more than competent. No it was the man himself, the gruff, ex-general, veteran of Nigeria’s terrible civil war when the emerging province of Biafra was ruthlessly crushed. Now poised to win a second term in Nigeria’s return to democracy his campaigning relies much on his natural warmth and good heartedness. But the rough, tough side is also there.
“I will throw you out of this plane”, he said in a moment of anger at one of my questions. “That’s what we do in Africa with people who need to be punished.” “Right now!”, he added, to make sure there was no question of the plane landing first. Luckily I have known Obasanjo for over 20 years and count him among one of my good friends. Still we are not buddies. I am a journalist, probing and getting under his skin. He is a politician, trying to build consensus in a bitterly fragmented, tormented society where corruption, poverty and criminality all seethe in great overworked urban agglomerations where tribal or religious differences can escalate a minor quarrel in the market place over overcharging into an all out tribal massacre with the heavy-handed, poorly trained army called in to impose order in its usual ham-fisted, often brutal, way.
Obasanjo can play the “Big Man”, as these authoritarian leaders, democratically elected or not, are rightly called in Africa. He told me on this plane journey, just after his first election victory, that he was “going to crack the whip”. And I knew instantly exactly what he meant. Once when staying with him on his farm I saw him react to one of his farm workers who had started to argue with him. Obasanjo quickly stooped to pick up a piece of thick steel wire that had dropped to the floor to make as if to whip him. The man immediately begged for mercy and changed his tune. It was all over in a second, but I realized I now understood how he had risen so quickly to the top of the military hierarchy during the civil war.
But there is also another side of him, also a tough one. When imprisoned by General Sani Abacha, the dictator who died of a heart attack in the arms of three prostitutes, Obasanjo wrote books on Christianity and spiritual meditation. He also organized a productive farm on prison wasteland, sufficient to give all the prisoners a decent meal every day. He jogged every morning and became the unofficial counsellor and religious advisor to all who needed his help – from murderers awaiting execution to men broken by torture.
His principals are deeply held and he lives them. At the age of 42, having inherited the dictatorship from his superior who was assassinated, he had walked away from the presidential palace, turned the country back to democracy, put on a pair of blue jeans and started a chicken and vegetable farm. He wanted to show this oil rich country that its real future laid on the land where still many more than half its people live.
The first time I went to stay with him he apologized for being five hours late. Driving home from his farm he had come upon a long line of traffic halted by an accident. He went to investigate and found six bodies on the ground. There was a small group of onlookers and two policemen standing idly by. No one was helping. The policemen claimed it was not their responsibility; they were en route to ‘other business’. Obasanjo ordered the crowd to help move the bodies to the roadside and commandeered a car to rush one of the dead woman who was obviously pregnant to the hospital, in the hope of saving the baby. He then directed traffic for three hours until the police arrived. The next day he learnt that the hospital had refused admission to the woman because there was no police certificate recording the accident. “I should have done the Caesarean myself, by the roadside”, was his only comment.
Now Obasanjo appears to be about to win a third term as president. The first time, a quarter a century ago, was as military dictator. Then beginning four years ago as a democratic strong man. Will his re-election solve Nigeria’s problems? Can this mixture of warm-heartedness, generous spirit, military no nonsense, shaded with undertones of violence, pull Nigeria out of its deeply diseased state? I have often talked late at night with Obasanjo about this question. For all his ebullience he is not an optimist. The problems are even worse than he thought before he was elected president. “I never knew the corruption ran so deep. Or that the administration of the power system could appear consciously designed so as not to work.”
Still, the Nigerians will re-elect him. They know he at least is incorruptible. They know he wants a God-fearing society where people do not murder and steal and people work and are paid for their work. If I were a Nigerian I might not fly with him, but I probably would vote for him.
I can be reached by phone +44 7785 351172 and e-mail: JonatPower@aol.com
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