Whether feigned or genuine, people have been astounded at the invasion of the US Capitol by misguided supporters of President Donald Trump. Nothing about that incident jolted me. I had long expected Trump supporters to go rogue, and I sensed that from observing supporters of the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd). Everything you need to understand about Trump’s rabid followers, you can learn from watching Buhari’s fundamentalist supporters. Until Buhari became reclusive from Nigeria’s realities, he too worked the emotions of his followers with the same demagogic charm as Trump does.
When the All Progressives Congress jumped into the fray to comment about the ongoing riotous power transition in the USA by telling Trump to emulate the sportsmanship attitude Buhari displayed after losing elections, they showed how poorly they process their own history. Since there is almost no chance that the US government will ever react to that press release, we know its contents were meant for Nigerians. Like other floundering democracies and dictators worldwide now taking potshots at the US, the APC too wants to relativise America’s political strength with Nigeria’s weakness.
Well, they did not need to ask Trump to emulate Buhari or any similar African leader. From day one, Trump’s presidency has all the hallmarks of an African dictator —buffoonish with as much brutishness as the law would allow him. From Teodoro Obiang to Paul Biya to Yoweri Museveni to Idriss Deby to Buhari, his use of power has been typical of Banana Republic’s kakistocracies. He has manipulated tribal and religious sentiments to override the institutions meant to check his excesses. That is why Trump has admirers in Africa. There is a vicarious pleasure those Africans must derive from watching the clownish leaders they have always seen on their continent wielding the ineffable power and spectacle of the American presidency.
If there is an African leader who can preach to Trump on how to exit an office gracefully after losing an election, it is Dr. Goodluck Jonathan. I do not believe a leader should be praised for doing the bare minimum, but Jonathan has rightly earned the right to pontificate on power transitions. He could have refused to leave office in 2015, but he chose to exit with dignity. When the same Jonathan defeated Buhari in 2011, his ardent supporters visited maniac violence on the country. If Buhari had lost in 2015, those supporters would have set the country on fire the same way Trump supporters are prepared to do.
Buhari is a bad loser. When he ran in 2003, 2007, and 2011, he hardly got votes beyond his northern enclave, but his self-entitlement drove him to contest the results in the courts. Yes, Nigerian elections are typically fraught with irregularities but his litigation was not in good faith. He wanted to achieve the same thing Trump is doing presently: sow disaffection in the polity against the winner of the election. Since he lost, Trump has raised more than $400m from his supporters, who have been made to believe he still has a chance of re-election. They keep donating money to his cause, but their chances of victory are non-existent. Their cases have been thrown out of court for lack of merit over 60 times. Even a Supreme Court stacked in their favour tossed them out twice.
Going to court to contest an election you clearly lost is a confidence trick to keep your supporters in a liminal mode. By trying out possible avenues to retaining the presidency, those who voted come to expect an impending victory. Though you are the loser, your shadow looms large over the new administration to the point it becomes impossible for the winner to build a country where sectional interests are subordinated to larger goals. Since the emotions such supporters invested in the election tend to be very raw post-election, they are manipulable to delegitimise the winner. Those supporters grow discontented enough to wish away the constraints of democratic processes and crave authoritarianism.
When Buhari first got to power in 2015, it was not surprising some of his supporters wanted him to throw out the constitution so that he could fight corruption with unimpeded brutality. For weeks in December, Trump supporters too demanded he imposed “martial law.” It is unclear if they understood the implication, but they were ready to throw away their country for Trump’s sake.
Now, in a country with weak institutions like Nigeria, there is a strong case to be made for going to court to contest a rigged election. Such decisions could test the strength of institutions to the point that its weak points are rendered visible. When such weaknesses are highlighted, the society can work towards redress. Unfortunately, ours is a country where the architecture of democracy begins and ends with elections. Once people win an election, the only thing that matters to them is winning, and at whatever costs. The person who goes to court to contend an election rigged against him gets into the same office and exploits his chance to rig. In January 2019, the same Buhari that went to court thrice to contend the presidential elections he lost also boasted that their party won Osun State governorship election through “remote control.” That character inconsistency is telling.
The US has had its fair share of poor leaders, but until Trump, they have always carried themselves with the ennobling dignity of the office. After losing their re-election bid, they exited with grace. Trump is different, and that is not because he has a legitimate cause to pursue.
We know from a New York Times expose on his tax returns that his finances are in the doldrums. He is a broke billionaire. Post-presidency, prosecutors will go after him over a series of alleged ethical violations. Even if he does not end up in jail, he will be disgraced. The only thing that can shield him from his alleged infractions is to remain the president for as long as possible. If he had won the second term, he would have tried to shove aside the 22nd Amendment and contest a third term. He even went to the extent of calling a government official in Georgia state and urging them to “recalculate” election figures to find votes for him. For a US president to resort to the “remote control” African leaders use to win an election, he must be really desperate.
In 2015, when ex-president Barack Obama gave a speech in Ghana, he urged African leaders to build strong institutions rather than strong men. According to him, “There’s a lot that I’d like to do to keep America moving. But the law is the law, and no person is above the law, not even the president.” I am sure the past four years of Trump have shown Obama that his “strong institutions vs. strong man” dichotomy needs a rethinking. A country can have strong institutions like the US and still be vulnerable to the machinations of a strong man, a wannabe dictator like Trump. Trump’s biggest card trick has been to manipulate his mob of followers against state officials who would have applied the checks and balances of democracy against his immoderations. When he was impeached for abuse of office, his party members shielded him from the repercussions of his egregious offence. If they had done otherwise, he would have sent his hounds against them. Representative democracy only goes so far if the people one represents have principles and strong civic values.
The APC should not fool itself that Buhari has any integrity useful for strengthening national institutions. His resort to the courts was not about building strong democratic traditions, it was about him. If there is a lesson to learn from him and Trump, it is that whether a country’s institution is strong or weak, dictators can use the instruments of democracy against democracy itself. Unlike the 1980s when Buhari’s goons beat up people on the streets, now they stir their followers’ primal instincts to dangerous levels, unleash them against democracy, and pass off such actions as the “will of the people.”
Credit: Abimbola Adelakun, Punch