I am somewhat disappointed by the barrage of ego massaging orations by those who claim to know late Abba Kyari possibly more than himself. I have read dreamers and those who chauffeured friends to Abba Kyari’s home to hear from the horse’s mouth concerning issues that are yet shrouded in secrecy. I have read those who ate breakfast and dinner, and had to even make Hon. Emeka Ihedioha to speak to the late Chief of Staff after the former’s ouster by the questionable Supreme Court’s verdict that remains a puzzle till date. I was just wondering a couple of days ago, if everybody had to be driven to Kyari’s home to seek clarification, how much of that exercise would alter the historical narrative of the late Kyari. If the life of Kyari as a Chief of Staff wasn’t one of a puzzle, would there be any deliberate attempt to apply detergent to wash him clean of all the halitosis that was hurled at him? And like a puzzle, so many deductions would be derived from his persona; from close breakfast friends, dinner friends, platonic friends, mutual friends, and those who apply his public conduct to derive their impression of a man who was academically brilliant but politically superficial in the power equation that factorised Buhari’s Aso Villa politics.
No angel Gabriel would convince me that Abba Kyari was not nepotistic in a government that wears that label as a trademark. An Abba Kyari that his friends are selling to us now, could not have feigned ignorance of the alleged numerous skewed appointments of Katsina natives into Buhari’s government.
He could not have been in that government and yet, Zamfara state at some point was almost completely overrun by armed bandits. In just a day, over 250 were reportedly slaughtered in Dansadau, but Abba Kyari’s principal, allegedly never considered it expedient to visit the state. Ditto for Sokoto, Kaduna, Taraba and Benue states that were held hostage at various times by herdsmen and armed bandits. When Kyari’s principal eventually visited Plateau, Benue and Taraba, he saw the reality of a country that thrives in contradiction. He was shocked to find out that his then Inspector General of Police Idris Kpotun Ibrahim, could not spend a night in Makurdi. He blamed foreigners for the mayhems and literarily exonerated the herdsmen who had held the country hostage.Since his principal had literally bequeathed governance to him, how much of his acquired knowledge was he able to apply to dissect the issues, in order to derive an informed perspective of the plausible solutions to the perennial crisis?
It will be out of place for anyone to summarily declare that Abba Kyari was a completely bad man. That would be an unfair assessment of a man who had served in various capacities and impacted on the lives of people. But to be a courier to Abba Kyari in order to get the flip side of any knotty issue, was to me, an indentured servitude that didn’t help the man’s public rating. The leaked memo written by the National Security Adviser, Babagana Monguno complaining about usurpation of responsibility could not have been a Cambridge University thesis. He was practically in charge of a responsibility that was outside the call of his briefs. In an ideal situation, the National Security Adviser, is vested with the responsibility of coordinating all the service chiefs and other security agencies to build a synergy that reinforces performance. But in a presidency where the number one citizen manifestly exposes the huge leadership gaps, a chief of staff would naturally want to fill the void. But filling the void does not mean you should break the protocol. That was the crux of the matter. Any chief of staff that is blindly loyal to his principal at the detriment of delivering on governance, is not worthy to occupy the office. Loyalty pales into insignificance once so much job is left undone, or when the approval rating of his principal suddenly plummets for lack of direction. And as a Chief of Staff, he must take his own share of the blame.
Kyari’s appearance may seem austere, but it is not enough to paint him in borrowed robes. He was acquisitive in every sense of the word. He belongs to the category of Northern conservatives, whose public outlook is direct opposite of their self worth. Ismaila Funtua, Sani Zango Daura, Mamman Daura, Hameed Alli and a couple of others are the last vestiges of Northern conservatives who are materially moneyed with a deceptive carriage. Some of them wear the cloak of deception to confuse their undiscerning army of almajiris (or to camouflage their principal’s rhetoric of “fighting corruption “), who have become endangered species in a country of limited opportunities. They display frugality and austerity in the open and unrestrained opulence in the inner confines of their homes. And the assurance of a cabal, superintended by Abba Kyari, more as the executioner-in-chief, ruffled feathers and heightened political tensions within the geographic space of Aso Villa. Mamman Daura was booted out by the irrepressible First Lady. His daughter was also shown the exit door in a drama of consternation that saw indecent muscle flexing between Aisha Buhari and Mamman Daura’s family.
Abba Kyari was a puzzle both in life and in death that would not be easily unravelled. Even in death, he remains a puzzle. He had three birth dates. He was 67, 71 and 81 depending on the available details at your disposal. His place of death was unknown to the public. Femi Adesina’s expression when he heard of the news of his death further underscores the myth around his death: ” how, when and where”. If you link that with some claims by online news report that it wasn’t Kyari’s corpse that was buried in Abuja but that of his aide, named Dauda, the puzzle becomes instructively compelling. The secrecy of his treatment complemented that of his principal, the president, who spent almost a year cumulatively in London for yet an undisclosed ailment. If president Buhari were to be performing superlatively, the searchlight on Abba Kyari would have earned him accolades. But in a government that is almost run in absentia, backed by a strong, oligarchic cabal that was reticent and brutish, it will be impossible to exonerate Kyari from the collective guilt that stares them in the face. The government has been accused of being corrupt, and its response to infrastructural development in the last five years has been a mere drudgery, its unemployment profile is alarming, job losses statistics are damning, insecurity rating has been a bile in the dish, while under it, kidnapping and armed banditry have reportedly become the fastest growing industries in Nigeria.
What were the takes of Kyari in all of these minuses that glaringly put the government on harm’s way in the hearts of the citizenry? Was he proud as a Chief of Staff that his principal is presiding over one of the most allegedly unexciting, uninspiring, clueless, spineless and nepotistic government in Nigeria that lacks the capacity and competence to take proactive initiatives to frontally address our challenges? How can you keep the head of an anti-corruption agency, the EFCC, Ibrahim Magu, in an acting capacity for more than four years without confirming his appointment or showing him the exit door? Is that what the law prescribes? Should we break the law to fight corruption? What did Abba Kyari do to correct the anomally in the appointment saga of Ibrahim Magu? What politics was at play during the Saraki-led 8th Assembly when Nigeria’s legislature became a theatre of the absurd following siege to the National Assembly and the residence of the then Senate President? Was that the normative principle in a democracy? What about the many alleged skewed appointments that completely run foul of the Federal Character Commission law? Or how do we describe the appointments of dead persons into board positions in 2017, or the papering of Babachir Lawal’s alleged corruption until public noise forced him out as Secretary to Government? What about the spurious allegations leveled against Justice Onnoghen to allegedly ease him out or the prolonged detention of Sambo Dasuki in president Buhari’s gulag and the subterranean recall of Abdulrasheed Maina before the bubble burst?
The point must be made that Abba Kyari lived his full circle and died in active service. The facts of his trajectory should be stated from the point of view of his public service performance and not those dilettante details between friends on breakfast or dinner table. He was powerful by virtue of his office and position. He could have stepped on toes wittingly or unwittingly. He might have offended some people and befriended others. He operated behind the scene and called the shots as the number one appointee in the presidency. He represented so many parts to so many people, reason why an assessment of his public service would naturally derive from people’s perception of his persona and conduct.
Those who are presently marketing him did him a great disservice for not telling us the inherent attributes of a man who indubitably acquired the sobriquet of being the “de facto” president, silencing the Vice President, and becoming the Lord of the Manor in the Presidency. These claims do not mean he won’t rest in peace, or alter God’s verdict. Like every other mortal, we all must taste death to keep appointment with our creator. But, a man’s trajectory in life must form part of the recollections and odysseys in trying to document his history. This idea of not talking ill of the dead is defeatist, self serving and distracts from the historical chronicles of a man’s life. But for such chronicle, we would not have known the cruelty of Josef Stalin when he presided over Old Russia, Idi-amin Dada of Uganda, Ghadaffi of Libya, Sadam Hussein of Iraq, or the benevolence of Pope John Paul ll.
Concluded..
NB: Prince Kassim Afegbua, a former Edo State Commissioner for Information and Orientation wrote in from Abuja.