Focus on moves to impeach President Obasanjo

Persistent wrangling between the executive and legislative arms of government in Nigeria took a critical turn when the House of Representatives last month gave President Olusegun Obasanjo a fortnight to resign or face impeachment. The two weeks have since passed, with Obasanjo defying the motion of the lower chamber of parliament, ridiculing it as "a joke taken too far". Rather than easing, however, the crisis continues. Indeed, Obasanjo's political troubles appeared to deepen when the Senate threw its weight behind the House of Representatives' impeachment threat, on 27 August. Different committees of both houses are now liaising to articulate the basis for charges of breaches of the constitution, incompetence and abetting corruption against Obasanjo, and to prepare for an impeachment process. The charges revolve around allegations that Obasanjo failed to implement budgets passed in the past three years according to the appropriation law, but also address military operations he ordered in which hundreds of people were killed at Odi in the southern oil region in 1999 and at Zaki Biam in central Nigeria in 2001. All of these developments underline the depth of bitter squabbles that riddle the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP). Despite commanding an overwhelming majority in both chambers of parliament, PDP legislators are up in arms against an executive they accuse of dictatorial tendencies and not carrying them along in the business of governance. More worrying for Africa's most populous country of 120 million - which ended more than 15 years of unbroken military rule in 1999 - are fears that the rising political tension might spin out of control; the latest troubles have only aggravated what has been a chaotic and violent build-up to general elections due early next year. Besides, with more than 250 ethnic groups and a measure of religious tension (largely between a mainly Muslim north and a south populated mostly by Christians and adherents of traditional religions), political differences in Nigeria easily degenerate into ethno-religious violence. In the past, similar instability has provided the pretext under which various military groups have seized power. Out of Nigeria's four decades as an independent nation, military elements have held power for 29 years. Already opinion on the crisis facing Obasanjo has divided along the major ethnic fault lines: many northern, Hausa-speaking Muslims, who had shown great electoral support for him, believe he has failed to live up to expectations and want to see his back; yet in the southwest, where he fared badly in elections having been perceived as a northern stooge, the impeachment threat is now seen as an affront to his whole Yoruba tribe. The Oodua People's Congress (OPC) militia group, which purports to defend the interests of the Yoruba, has declared that southwest Nigeria will move to secede if Obasanjo is removed from office. "We believe from the statement of the House of Representatives that this is a carefully planned move to finally rubbish the Yoruba as a people," Fredrick Fasehun, medical doctor and OPC president, said in a statement. Governors of the six southwestern states, who belong to the opposition Alliance for Democracy (AD), have also weighed in on the side of the president. Governor Segun Osoba of Obasanjo's home state, Ogun, described the impeachment move as an attempt to bring the military back to power. In the southeast, dominated by the Igbo people, one of the three biggest ethnic groups in the country, responses have ranged from the indifferent to pointedly anti-Obasanjo feelings. According to Elliot Uko of the Igbo Youth Movement, the president deserves to be removed from office because of his "dictatorial tendencies and abysmal performance" in office. In the adjoining Niger Delta, Obasanjo's perceived failure to redeem electoral promises made to the oil region and his inclination to concentrate oil revenues in the coffers of the federal government, have not enamoured either him to the ethnic minorities of the area. Perhaps most ominous for the country, though, are alleged attempts to draw the military into the fray. Obasanjo's supporters maintain that some legislators are involved in a plot with elements in the military to destabilise the polity and get soldiers to overthrow the government. And while pledging loyalty to the president, Chief of Defence Staff Admiral Ibrahim Ogohi has acknowledged that some unnamed people were taking advantage of the crisis "to incite the members of the armed forces against the constitutionally elected government". Legislators opposed to Obasanjo responded by saying that the government was merely priming public opinion for repressive measures, including slapping treason charges on them, and have vowed to resist any military intervention. But whatever the jockeying for position, all parties involved have to deal with the feasibility of the impeachment threat based on the allegations against Obasanjo: if the legislature finds the allegations grave enough, it is expected to pass a motion to investigate by a two-thirds majority. This would pass matters into the hands of the Chief Justice, who is required by the constitution to set up an independent panel to investigate such allegations over a three-month period. Where the panel considers the allegations proven, the legislature only has to adopt the report by a two-thirds majority to effect the removal of a president. "It is at this point that the genie would be let out of the bottle in the Nigerian context," Ike Onyekwere, a political analyst, told IRIN. "The understanding in 1999 was that it was the turn of the south to produce a president. If Obasanjo should go and his deputy, (Atiku Abubakar) a Muslim northerner, steps in, there is bound to be trouble." After northerners' dominance of power in Nigeria for more than 35 years, through both military and civilian rulers, few people in the south would countenance another northerner at the helm - especially in the context of impeachment proceedings against a southerner, Onyekwere said. "It is bound to cause upheavals," he added For this reason alone, not many analysts believe the legislators can go all the way and remove Obasanjo from office. Besides, procedural delays expected in the impeachment process suggest that it is unlikely to be completed before the next general elections are held. "I believe the impeachment threat has already achieved most of what it was meant to do, which was primarily to rattle President Obasanjo and curb his evident executive excesses," Salisu Maina, a political science lecturer, told IRIN. "Another thing is that, since he is seeking re-election, the threat is bound to damage him politically and weaken his chances of securing his party's nomination," he added.