We woke up to learn that Nigeria fighter jets swooped on the plotters who tried to remove the President of Benin Republic, via a military coup .By standard understanding of a means of governance, in modern society, we are told it should be democratic, whereby, the people go to the polls on specific days in an election season to choose their representatives through a free and fair election. The outcome of such a process is often referred to as “government of the people by the people for the people”.That is as far as the classic definition of Democracy as an an institution by those who ‘invented’ as a process, can go.But the reality of peoples experiences, especially in Africa says otherwise. By going into Benin Republic, an independent country, Nigeria portrayed iteself as a defender of democracy as a means of accessing power and authority. In a way, it considered the attempted military takeover at worst, a criminal act, and, at best, a moral- political aberration. But is there no hypocrisy, weaved around a pole of irony here?. One, it is an irony, indeed, a national embarrassment that the Nigerian state posses such a rapid response military capacity to save ‘democracy’, even when it has shamelessly been unable to rescue its own children that are, according to Nigeria National Security Adviser, being taken good care of by kidnappers in their various camps. In other words, children, forcefully taken away from their schools, are presumed safer in the custody of terrorists than in the warm embraces of their different parents.
Meanwhile, the Nigerian state that would reject a suggestion by a foreign power to help secure its territory from the dominance of terrorists, otherwise called bandits, anchoring its objection on Sovereignty, did not see anything morally wrong and contradictory when its Airforce took to the sky and crossed into the airspace of an independent country- in the name of protecting its president from being overthrown by the country’s armed forces Is it not hypocritical to condemn military coups, and consider it an abomination to a means of choosing leaders .Otherwise, how is a military coup worse than a “civilian coup”, where people can snatch, grab, and run away with power against the expressed wish of the people? The truth is, it is no point talking of democracy when votes of citizens do not matter in deciding those who should occupy the seat of power and authority. In situations, as we often witness in Africa, especially in Nigeria, whereby elections are brazenly rigged, “in a do or die” manner, through the complicity of electoral officers, party thugs, and security personnel that are deployed to polling stations to ensure that elections are free and fear, devoid of harassment, intimidation and actual violence, citizen- voters are reduced to mere serves, assembled as unwilling witnesses to the canonisation of feudal lords in a fiefdom
In any case, democracy itself is a process, a form to decide who rules in a community under stipulated rules of engagement. It is a social contract, with offer and acceptance, and a consideration attached. It does not necessarily guarantee contents of good governance as may be desired by the people. The character and mode of governance by those who comes into authority through a guided electoral process also determine the wholesomeness of democracy as an institution. A situation, whereby, a supposed elected leader turns tyrannical, and sustains his despotism by a process of state capture, with all institutions that should ensure freedom of choice for citizens to effect a regime change has been emasculated can no longer be deemed democratic. Under such situation, the people have a duty to revolt to remove such usurpers of authority , now merely exercising brute power. Between power and authority, a conceptual difference exists
Truth is, Nigeria playing the guiding angel of democracy in Benin Republic is no more than a demonstrated hypocrisy because the ruling party in Nigeria has done everything possible to destroy every pillars on which the institution of democracy is anchored, just as it has rendered major opposition platforms prostrate, barely existinginastate of suspended animation, as many are not in a position to offer much at coming election against the ruling party. Regrettably, seeking relief through the judicial process seems closed, as the judiciary appears compromised, with judges at their conference heard reciting party anthem, assuring the president to “…stand on your mandate” .A reductionist understanding of Benin Republic show of force is no more than a display of enlightened self interest. The Nigerian leader has only gone to save his colleague in bad governance, against whom the people of Benin have become powerless, as he continue to rig himself back into office, after he was first elected in 2016, and planning to be ‘re-elected in 2026. In Benin, leaders of major opposition political part are either in exile, or in jail, after being convicted and sentenced on trumped up charges that were politically motivated. Yet, no one should remind me of a misplaced consolation, not more than the need to sound politically correct, that the worst of democracy is better than the best of military regimes. Let the people that has experienced both know and decide if a sustained general revolt by the people against bad governance template by a despotic leader and a compromised parliament is not the best against the two- real, and apparent despotism. The point remains: citizens have no business tolerating either- an injured democracy and a healthy military dispensation.
