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Sunday, October 20, 2019

Buhari’s House of Commotion and Mamman Daura’s “Glass House”

This is a must read!!!!











My column on the back page of the Nigerian Tribune on Saturday: A few days before it became grist for Nigeria’s overactive social media rumor mills, a retired general and contemporary of Muhammadu Buhari’s told me, in the course of a 30-minute phone conversation, that Mamman Daura, Buhari’s nephew who is nonetheless older than him by three years, had made up his mind to “get at” Aisha Buhari by arranging a quiet marriage between Humanitarian Affairs Minister Sadiya Umar Farouq and Muhammadu Buhari.

He mentioned this as an aside and seemed to expect me to be curious enough about what he had told me to ask further questions. But I didn’t. That appeared to have shocked him, so he asked why I wasn’t piqued by what he had told me. I said it was because it frankly didn’t interest me what Buhari did in his private space.

I am by no means claiming any moral high grounds here. I think it’s legitimate to be curious about the private lives of public officials whose decisions have consequences for millions of people, but that’s not my own inclination. I care about the private affairs of public officials only if their private affairs impinge on public policy.

That was why, in spite of pressures from friends and social media followers, I kept a studied silence on the social media frenzy over this issue. As I told the general, it means nothing to me that “Buhari has been dating Sadiya since CPC [Congress for Progressive Change] days”; that’s his private business, which, in my opinion, we should be decent enough to respect.

I’m more worried, I told him, by the fact that Sadiya Umar Farouq is minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management & Social Development even when, according to a two-year-old Daily Nigerian investigation titled “INVESTIGATION: Unmasking the real #Dabinogate beneficiaries,” she allegedly diverted and misappropriated 200 tonnes of date palms (dabino) famously donated to internally displaced persons in the northeast by the Saudi Arabian government in 2017.

She was Federal Commissioner in charge of the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons at the time. According to the Daily Nigerian, she “diverted [the 200 tonnes of date palms] to Zamfara State and kept [them] in a warehouse, while the rest was distributed to traditional rulers.”

To steal from humanitarian donations to poor, vulnerable internally displaced people is the vilest, most ignoble, least defensible form of villainy there can ever be. But Buhari has rewarded her eye-wateringly larcenous treachery with an appointment as minister of—of all ministries— Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management & Social Development, a previously non-existent ministry!

Why would anyone create a ministry of “humanitarian affairs” and “disaster management” for a person who has a history of insensate cruelty toward people who are victims of disasters and who desperately need but have lacked humanitarian assistance? It’s like appointing a wolf to keep guard over sheep.

Curiously, Nigerians are more interested in her history of alleged romantic entanglements with Buhari (which should be no one’s business) than the fact of her heading a ministry which her past eminently disqualifies her for.

Anyway, why have I chosen to comment on the embarrassing public fight by Buhari’s obviously dysfunctional family even when I initially had no interest in it? Well, it’s because the way Buhari manages— or, more appropriately, mismanages—his immediate family provides insightful clues to how he “ungoverns” Nigeria.

Buhari is a feeble, indecisive, infirm, emotionally dependent person for whom the idea of taking responsibility is alien. People who know him intimately have told me that his psychological and emotional makeup is unsuited for leadership. He is not only a loner; he always relies on others to take decisions for him.

People close to him have told me long before now that Buhari has an innately and enduringly infantile craving for a paternal dictatorship. I don’t know if this has anything to do with the fact that he lost his father at an early age and didn’t quite experience sustained paternal guidance. But Mamman Daura has been Buhari’s emotional and intellectual fortress and his father figure, although they are only about three years apart in age. Daura makes momentous decisions for Buhari and rules on his behalf through Abba Kyari, his protégé.

Mamman Daura is the first son of Buhari’s oldest half-brother from a different mother. That makes Buhari his uncle, and him Buhari’s nephew. Many people, particularly from the South, have a hard time wrapping their heads around this. Well, I have a similar situation. My late father married a younger woman and had his last child when he was 80, so my first daughter is older than my youngest half-brother. My daughter still struggles to call him her uncle.

This is important because Mamman Daura and his sidekick Abba Kyari are the power behind the throne. They constitute the nucleus of the ill-famed Aso Rock cabal that acts as Buhari’s puppeteers. In my October 22, 2016 column titled “Aisha Buhari and the Evil Aso Rock Cabal,” I pointed out that “Buhari is held hostage by an evil, sneaky, corrupt, vulturous, and conniving cabal that ensures that his wife doesn’t see him even in the ‘kitchen,’ the ‘living room,’ or ‘the other room.’

“The BBC interview was Aisha’s vigorous ventilation of pent-up anguish against a cold, calculating, and corrupt cabal that has made Buhari a stranger to his own wife.” It’s the fifth most widely read article of all time on my blog because although it was cryptic, many people, particularly in the North, knew what I was talking about. I was told that the cabal actually met to discuss who divulged this information to me.

It’s supremely emblematic that Mamman Daura (along with his entire family) lives in a wing of the Presidential Villa called the “Glass House,” according to his spoilt, entitled daughter by the name of Fatima Mamman Daura. “Glass house” is a metaphoric expression that means a position or a situation that invites critical public scrutiny. Derived from the English proverb “Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones,” it calls attention to hypocrisy.

And Mamman Daura is a dyed-in-the-wool hypocrite. Although he is a monogamist, he wanted to marry a second wife for his younger uncle until he was shamed into abandoning it. Similarly, in “Editing a Government Newspaper in Nigeria,” a chapter he contributed to a book titled Reporting Africa edited by Olav Stokke, he rhapsodized over editing the New Nigerian that was “owned and subsidized by the Government yet we criticize their action.” He characterized this as an “anomaly neither properly understood by the people generally nor particularly liked by some government officials.” Yet, he is now the intellectual driver of a government that supervises one of the most brutal strangulation of the news media and of freedom of speech itself.

I am glad that Mamman Daura, Nigeria’s de facto president, is now coming out of the shadows. You can’t live in the Glass House, throw stones at Nigerians, and continue to live in the shadows.

Nonetheless, Mrs. Aisha Buhari herself isn’t the victim— and hero of democracy— she’s positioning herself to be. Her fight against Mamman Daura (and Abba Kyari) is mostly over access to the spoils of governance.

She has been given several concessions by the cabal, but she always wants more. For instance, her older brother by the name of Ahmed Halilu was recently quietly appointed as one of only two executive directors at the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting PLC, among several concessions she has been given. So don’t cry for her. Cry for Nigeria.








24 comments:

  1. This is sad! I weep for Nigeria. See the people that have locked this country down.

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  2. I pity our miseducated fools who actually believe that Buhari has anything to offer Nigeria. You can't give what you don't have.
    Buhari by far is deeply corrupt. Look at his pals and people around him. His record on education, healthcare care, security, economy and job creation is a disaster. Most of his ministers have corruption cases hanging on their necks. Yet some fools blindly follow and defend the greatest corn artist of our time. A man that has never articulated an opinion piece nor written an OP-ed. Heck, he's never given a press conference because he cannot articulate anything.

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    1. How I wish Nigerian youth will stand up for their future. They seem so hopeless. Can you imagine the leadership we have. Why are we not screaming at the top of our voice. Why are religious leaders quite..why am I quite😩

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  3. Oh!!! How I love Farooq Kperogi style of journalism. Quite a good read. I always look forward for his piece all the time. I have always talked about the man called Mamman Daura since 2017 but each time I do, people takes it to be tribal sentiment. So good it's all coming out to light now. For sometime now I decided to keep away from commenting on political post for I see it as exercise in futility when the people involved are hell bent on destroying the country.

    Buhari is a mistake I will never wish on my enemies or any African countries. Funny thing is that some people will still support him in all this revelation staring at them but I am not surprise, for that's how the black mind works.

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    1. Boy, whatever you have been saying about Mamman Daura is not new to any of us. Don’t come here ranting as if you have first hand information and sources from the inside as you always lie that you do. Nobody accuses you of tribal bigotry. It is just that you are an example of a tribal bigot which you shamelessly demonstrate in your ever-ill-informed comments full of lies and misinformation. Talking about how black mind works, I bet you know nothing about black minds except the people you come in contact with in port Harcourt and Enugu. Nothing more! So be quiet for well informed and educated people to speak about important issues.
      Your political posts make no sense except for the irrational arguments and poor grammatical and sentence structures you shove down our throats everyday.

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    2. I know you were going to respond but I won't dignify you with more words, for you were among the change mantra cum next level fraud millions of Nigerians are suffering today. I pray God forgive you and your likes for this heinous crime you brought against innocent Nigerians.

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    3. Very well said.

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  4. Wow, wow, wow, my dear Nation Nigeria is in deep bondage of corruption, backwardness and confusion, from my own point of view I have said that Nigeria and Nigerians need a leader that is business oriented, someone that will treat Nigeria as his or her own Company and only aim at bringing expansion, growth and profit, since independence Nigeria has been cursed with bad leadership and unaccountable government, who would rescue us from this mess, greediness and selfishness is the very quality that defines the leadership of Nigeria.

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  5. SMH. Lost for words. Nigeria is the last thing on these greed people’s mind.

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  6. Now i know we have a statue as a president...God do something for Nigerians fast please

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  7. God of GEJ!
    Let them continue to fight and expose their dirty dealings!

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  8. Beautifully written,we need to pay more attention to issues like this instead we are distorted with the noise on social media.Countries like Hong Kong, Lebanon, Iraq, Ecuador and so many more are protesting and demanding accountability from their government and I need to remind you that their annual budgets and standard of living are far greater than ours.Please Nigeria wake up we are sinking.

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  9. Hmnn... this is terrifying, i used to believe in the Nigerian dream,that one day e go better but not anymore. I am losing hope. Nigeria's future looks so bleak with the kinds of leaders we have.
    Nobody is taking anything to the afterlife, yet the greedy way wealth is being amassed is crazy. Diverting those donated dates is an all time low. At the end of the day na six feet oo... Nothing at all. So why can't we be good to one another. Be kind, lend an helping hand, be the reason for someone's happiness...
    It is well.

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  10. Wow This is so sad.

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  11. This is deep, Nigeria is in a deep mess and revolution is the only way out.

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  12. Farooq Kperoogi is a very Good Investigative Journalist
    Jaafar Jaafar is another good investigative journalist.

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  13. Farook Kperogi is so far the only one talking about Nigerian Issue!Petra Akiti, and Ofu Enaghara too.

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  14. I need to leave the country ASAP, is this one a country? A vegetable as a country's president is that one a president? Mtcheeeew

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  15. This is so sad to read. Making Buhari our president is the worst thing to happen to us.

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  16. Hmmmmmm there was a country......

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  17. Buhari is such a desparate person. Did people forget his major critique on Jonathan???? I listened to various interview he held with television and his major selling point was on petroleum- he claimed to be an expert on petroleum. People saw him as legit not knowing that is just a pure empty head, very disengenous and fraud personafide.

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