A vice president and his troubles at home

POLITICIANS always deny anything negative attributed to them. In Nigeria, they have practised the denial act to a level that many people do not take them serious anymore. Even those of them who now make legitimate denials have very little believability attached to their denials by the people. In the last few days, it has become the lot of Vice President Goodluck Jonathan to make his own denial over reported running battles he was said to be having with the former governor of his state, Chief Timipre Sylva.

No vice president would want to be cast in the mould of a political bully who makes life miserable for a lowly placed governor of not even a neighbouring state, but his own. So, the vice president has been shouting to the hearing of those who have been fed with the story that he is at war with Sylva that no such thing exists. Why would a vice president bully his governor, especially when such vice president is Dr. Jonathan who has so far managed to present himself to the public as a man who is humble, quiet and cannot hurt a fly, let alone disrupting the administration of his home state?

If you put an age-old saying that ‘there is no smoke without fire’ and the public image of the vice president as a peace maker together, you will likely be left with no other option than to wait for more crystal developments before taking sides with Sylva or Jonathan.
The number two citizen’s public image got a boost few days ago when his boss, President Umaru Yar’Adua, gave what could be a vote of confidence and a re-affirmation of that good image to the vice president. The president did this last Saturday at the conferment of the Honourary Doctor of Science Degree on Dr. Jonathan by the University of Port Harcourt during its 24th Convocation ceremony in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital.

“Let me at this point recognise the honourary awardee and well respected Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and former Governor of Bayelsa State. In him, I have found a vice president who is reliable, open-minded, honest, transparent, loving, godly, humble, focused and positively self-motivated to offer his very best to the service of our beloved country. His sense of humility and dedication are well-known qualities which all public officers should emulate,” Yar’Adua said.

It would be excellent for the vice president if Yar’Adua’s public declaration is actually what he thinks of Jonathan deep inside him. Politicians do a lot of double talk. The reported face-off between Sylva and Jonathan is not new in Nigerian politics. From the First Republic’s federal versus regional to the Second Republic’ notorious Presidential Liaison Officers (PLOs) appointed by the defunct National Party of Nigeria (NPN)-led Federal Government, it was always there. The PLOs left ruins in states where the NPN was not in power by employing everything to disrupt the state administrations.

In this dispensation, we have also witnessed the garrison politics of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). The nation has also witnessed the personal acrimony between former Senate President, Anyim Pius Anyim, and his then state governor, Dr. Sam Egwu. There was the face-off between former Senate President, Chief Adolphus Wabara, and his then state governor, Chief Orji Uzor Kalu, and several other similar cases of federal officers who had gone home to engage their state governors in bitter political contests. Each time they clashed, many political thugs lose their lives.

In unfortunate cases, some innocent citizens got killed in the cross-fire. Bayelsa’s case has not led to open conflagrations and one only hopes that the vice president’s denials represent the true situation in the state. Any fight between the supporters of these two men will be catastrophic because there is too much arms in Bayelsa waiting to be used.

Jonathan recently declared that there was no problem between him and Chief Sylva, who the vice president said was still a staunch member of his political family called the ‘Green Movement.’ The vice president has also vowed to lead Sylva’s re-election campaign to ensure that he returns to office. Sylva’s election was recently nullified by election tribunal. Every right-thinking person appreciates the fact that there is bound to be differences in political opinions among citizens of the state, but as the office of the vice president acknowledged few days ago, such differences should not amount to differences between Sylva and Jonathan.

The vice president’s office insisted that such differences between members of his political family were internal and that all efforts were geared towards resolving them. If, indeed, the number two citizen has been having problems with Sylva, let this olive branch from him show the return of peace. If Sylva wins and returns to the Government House, he should not forget that an egg does not engage a stone in a fight of strength, while the vice president should realise that a mighty stone that crushes an egg gets stained by the fluid.