Buhari's Exit and The Rest of US...

By edentu OROSO

Since the death of former President Muhammadu Buhari, social media has been agog with praise songs, curses, and critical reviews of the stead of a man who rode onto national consciousness on the fiat of a disciplined, almost invincible and no nonsense persona, and who left the stage of human actions with diverse impressions as legacies in the memories of the living.

In life’s short shrift journey, only a few individuals would rival Buhari’s silver streak of opportunities in national ethos. Starting as a young military officer to the pinnacle of his career as the Head of State of a military junta in 1983, to becoming a democratically elected President of Nigeria, the most populous Black nation, in 2015, after a serial presidential bid, he had never ceased to elicit a cult following with a swathe of northern elites and youths with a near mythical aura. Perhaps, only former President Olusegun Obasanjo who had been a military Head of State and two term President as Buhari himself equals that stellar record of strategic leadership of this blessed country twice.  

Many whose paths crossed with Buhari’s would readily attest of his infectious magnetism. Like the radiant sun, his incandescence touched not only the precincts of family but those outside military and political circles. His trademark gapped-tooth smile often buoyed the spirits of those who found themselves breathing within the ambit of the atmosphere in which he thrived. 

We still have fond memories of his enlivened promises over the years to rejig our fortunes for the common good whenever he had the chance to solicit for our votes during those marathon campaign sessions around the country. We can still hear his warm laughter echo through our national psyche…the zest with which he took his strides on earth, the embers of the splendid clannish and national hopes he fanned in the light of his visions for a pluralistic Nigeria, and the faint glimpses of the fears that lurked in the bowels of our hearts about broken promises and the place of his strides in posterity.

We can still perceive the aroma of all those sumptuous meals of vaulted ethnicity you prepared even at the twilight of your life - the alleged railway lines to your ancetral home in Mahradi, (or is it a petroleum refinery in Chad when those you presided over were moribund?), so you don’t feel a sense of being a bad kith and kin to the Fulani stock when presiding over a rich and benevolent country such as Nigeria. And we recall you ever teasing the youths to stop “being pepertually lazy” with your knack for invective humour on our collective aspirations, as you often grinned and laughed at our follies as the good President you were.

One of the hardest truths about your death was your conviction, “I belong to nobody….” which meant that you were no man’s puppet on strings, that you possessed a certain magic wand with which you could steer the rein of Nigeria in the direction of our concerted prayers for better dawns, especially when the doubts crept in about the glaring religious fault-lines that your cleavages so wittingly created and your inability to say no to religious extremism in form of Boko Haram or banditry in the northeast. And your trust in our bond as an indivisible entity was such that you'd not question our diversity and needs. But that intrinsic aspect of your conviction, really never came to the fore in your tangential actions. 

Though we’d always treasured those moments you played the pragmatic and astute President, especially when we talked about the level of hardship the masses had to endure in the midst of great wealth, about the prevalent economic and security malaise, and about the unpredictable future. One thing glared in all this: your sterling strength of character, your unblemished record as an incorruptible, and your unwavering faith in turning things around.  A hero of unity, a tireless advocate for fiscal responsibility who held the forte for Nigeria when it mattered, you never for once abandoned the ship of state you were destined to steer….As a matter of fact, Nigeria came across as the religion you propitiated with zeal and wanton sacrifices.

We were stunned when the Federal Government spilled the sad news of your passage and some northern youths whom you protected with your last breath during your tenure poured out in droves chanting in glee “Buhari ya mutu” - Buhari is dead! Oh my God, such a cruel-hearted breed, ingrates that do not reckon with your dogged fight to upscale the North in all you did for eight years as President. 

These scathing words negate all he stood for in his lifetime as a leader who was keen on turning new leaves in the lives of kindred souls. In this vein, he gave more than he got in return from his kiths and kins. But we are certain, wherever he is at the moment, he’ll take life's blows with a pleasantness of heart. And he would smile knowing he came, saw and conquered. Even his detractors or staunch critics owe him the reckoning that he was as one of a kind. 

We could go on and on writing about our impressions of your persona and strides on this patch of the earth. We could easily write about the times you made it very clear that nepotism was a national hallmark after all. That it was fair to embrace the nepotistic impulse in national appointments and privileges. This maybe a by-product of systemic failures or political pressures and not necessarily a warp in individual principles. 

We could paint endless portraits of your incurable optimism about a prosperous and progressive Nigeria and how you often inspired our collective drive to always look at the brighter side of things than the grim realities of our experience. It'll be hard not to remember the beautiful mind behind an equally beautiful and multi-faceted persona that you are! We refer to you still in the present tense because your impressions are indelible in our hearts.

As he bades this stage farewell and takes his deserved seat next to Allah in the afterlife, it is our fervent prayer that the legacies he left behind will speak volumes of the good life he lived and that he'd smile down from Aljanah at his footprints on the sands of time and what Nigerians are able to accomplish in his absence. And we are certain that he’d be proud of the legacies his predecessor President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is leaving behind. 

Of course, the world will remember him as a man who came, saw and conquered in every sense of the word. Many envy who he was or who he became in the rituals of life. 

 Buhari was human, so had flaws and good traits just as everyone else. We do not mock him in death, but let his strides remind us of the transience of life and why we must be the best versions of ourselves while we live. Because people will always remember both our good and bad deeds when we’re gone. 

Adieu, the star from Daura that shone like a diamond in our skies and dimmed at noonday!