A cardinal condition of good governance is for the leadership to lead in line with the concerns of the followership. That is the essential distillate of the ageless definition of democracy as the government of the people, by the people and for the people. This means that a democratic government owes its direction and enterprise to the concerns of the governed at all times. In this context, even when reforms are being executed, such need to mirror the expectations of the wider cross section of the governed, as the entire purpose of good governance is to serve the people creditably. Hence, any deviation from this template diminishes the democratic credentials of any government. Just as well, any government that fails to heed this creed automatically disqualifies itself from the ranks of democracies, even if it may not accept this timeless truth. This could be the acid test the Bola Tinubu administration may be having difficulty with, given its manifest, entrenched fixation with intolerance for opposition tendencies, be such expressed in thought, speech or action. It is also in this context that the ongoing mismanagement by the Presidency of a simple homily by the Catholic Bishops Council of Nigeria (CBCN) during their recent visit to President Tinubu needs to be appreciated. This is also why the latter public reiteration of the CBCN stand by Cardinal John Onaiyekan in his recent interview with Arise TV is being twisted out of its deserved proper light by the handlers of the president. As is now public knowledge, during the visit to Tinubu by the CBCN delegation, the body raised concern over several issues that have plagued the polity and discomfited Nigerians – millions of whom are members of their ecclesiastical flock. Among their submissions to the president was the concern over the integrity of the forthcoming 2027 general polls, as the country is teetering towards a one-party state, a condition which remains in conflict with the intendment of the Nigerian constitution. The constitution provides for a multi-party democracy in order to the avail citizens the liberty of enjoying as many shades of political interest as possible. With the president’s political party – the All Progressives Congress (APC) – actively engaged in capture of the Nigerian state through vicious surreptitious maneuvers by the Presidency and is thereby controlling 32 out of 36 state governors – it remains a wonder how the clerics could have put their concern better. The CBCN also raised the issue of the depressed state of the economy along with the unprecedented state of privation and attendant despair which most Nigerians across the country were facing as daily life. In their specific words, the Nigerian “economy is bleeding.” From what is in the public domain about the CBCN visit, the president apparently disagreed with the position of the clerics in literally all that they presented to him. Of note was the dismissiveness with which the president treated the homily from the bishops. But matters did not end there. While Tinubu dismissed their observation outright and awarded his performance high marks, his media aides adopted the disposition of rabid attack dogs to denigrate the clergy men, and in particular, Onaiyekan without even addressing themselves to the merit of the position of the latter. Apparently, Onaiyekan’s sin was that he brought to the public domain and in context, the take-aways from the meeting between the president and the bishops. Interestingly, however, while the issues raised by Onaiyekan may not be fresh in the public space as such remain the real unmistakable state of affairs across the country, the fact that in the Arise TV interview, Onaiyekan conveyed a disturbingly detached disposition of the president to the real issues facing Nigerians outside the walls of Aso Rock, and his fixation on winning a second term in office by all means, have gotten under the skins of his handlers; hence their assault on the Cardinal as the whipping boy for the CBCN. The issue now remains the merit of the bishops’ homily in the context of relevance and timeliness. While the preponderance of commentaries on the matter hails the cleric for speaking truth to power, the Presidency is berating him for toeing a direction at variance with its narrative of the state of affairs. In that context therefore, the real issue before Nigerians borders on what Onaiyekan said and why it should or not irk the Presidency to attract so vehemently, a series of rebuttals and personal attacks on the cleric. Taken in perspective however, hardly is there any new angle in what Onaiyekan said that had not been said earlier by other observers, and even with more vehemence. His sin must, therefore, lie in the potency of the moral integrity behind his status in the context of which, his observation that the forthcoming polls may be compromised to the extent of denying opposition candidates a level playing ground, hit home. Appa
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