(The Nigerian presidential elections are happening this weekend. As citizens go to select who will rule or ruin the country for the next four years, here is a peek into the minds of some of the key players.)
REMI TINUBU
And now, the end is near, and so I face the final curtain. I’ve lived a life that’s full. I’ve travelled each and every highway. For what is a man, what has he got, if, in the end, he does not become king, and have everything his way?
Remi knows Bola like the rumbling in her stomach. He is humming a tune and rocking his head, eyes half shut. He is embarrassingly off-key but off-key is the only way she knows him, and the only way she loves him.
She has taken to intermittent fasting these days, preparing for the outfits she plans to wear when her Bola, the Lion of Bourdillon, the Asiwaju of Lagos and Asiwaju of her heart, is sworn in as president and she no longer needs to indulge the idiots in the Senate who never take her seriously because she is a woman.
—They only respect me when they want something from my husband, she has said many times, to herself and others.
The ones from Lagos know not to disrespect her as this would mean the end of their ambitions in a state fully controlled by her husband.
She is sitting with Bola in the brief period she has with him before the room is flooded with aides and supporters and politicians all desperate to be seen as loyal to the most powerful godfather in Nigerian politics. It is time for him to have lunch and she does not allow anyone to be present as she coaxes him to finish the food she has carefully prepared for him to eat. Not her personally, but she guides the process because she cannot risk him eating on the road and getting poisoned by any of the people who want to see her husband’s empire collapse. He has to eat healthily, especially with all the medication he has to take.
Bola breaks out of his reverie when she asks if he is ok.
He smiles at her, taking off his round glasses and holding her hand.
—Èmi l’ókàn, he says to her. It is my turn.
She holds his hand, nodding.
—Àwa l’ókàn, she says. It is our turn.
—Yes! Yes! He says, gratitude in his eyes. She does not need him to say words. She sees them on his dark lips, in his eyes—jaundiced from age—, in every muscle of his body. His thoughts come clearly to her:
By god, Remi has been good to me these days. And I am certain it is not because of the money or the power. Lesser women would have abandoned me, now that I cannot stand erect for long periods. And I am not even talking or other types of erection. These bloody fools, people I have laboured for all my life in public service, they laugh at my bladder control as if the bladders of their fathers and grandfathers are better than mine. When you do the kind of travel I do, you need to rehydrate often. And when you rehydrate often you need to get rid of that excess water. And water as they say will always find a way. It is not as if I need my bladder to govern Nigeria. I will use my brain. And Remi, she knows the value of my brain, and that is why she stood by me through thick and thin, even though to be fair I have always been thin.
Remi has stopped watching clips of Bola online. She has told her aides not to forward her clips either. She knows, like the back of her hand, what is at stake now. She knows there are only a few hours to the elections. She knows they have two main battlefronts: Lagos and Nigeria. Lagos would have been covered if not for the Igbos who do not know how to show gratitude for their hosts. Because how does a visitor come to your home and try to upstage you? This is why she thinks Oba Akiolu was right when he suggested that Sunday in 2015 that the Igbos should vote for the ruling party or risk perishing inside the lagoon.
—If not for pesky little things like cameras and human rights, the lagoon is where they all belong, she thinks.
She especially hates cameras. It was a camera that captured her on video decked in expensive ankara saying that the Igbos residing in the state were proving difficult despite the love shown to them. The video went viral and people were up in arms because she said that she would entreat “all the deities of Lagos to chase Igbo people out”. She was heard saying:
—Igbo who didn’t marry Yoruba, we will inherit them. Given how much we love Igbo, you now want to spoil everything. Igbo are proving difficult. We will inherit you.
She still does not know why anyone would baulk at her honesty. Weren’t there other ethnicities living in Lagos? Ethnicities that knew their place in the pecking order? Which other group constituted themselves such a nuisance in the state, so much she fears that, now that there is an Igbo frontrunner on the ballot, her husband’s lifelong dream of governing the country might be impeded by millions of Igbos, many of whom reside in Lagos.
—Honestly, the lagoon is where they belong, she thinks.
And General Buhari, despite his attending the campaign rallies isn’t showing support like the leader of a party should. Remi remembers telling Bola in 2015 not to trust General Buhari.
—I told him. I told him o! She said to her friend, a fellow senator from Lagos on the phone yesterday reminding him of what she told him 8 years before.
—General Buhari. Will he not also be a liability or embarrass us? Because if it is the same Buhari of 2003, 2007, and 2011, I am afraid.”
Those were her exact words.
The senator on the phone told her: A leopard never changes his spots
—Which leopard? That one is a snake o. Silent-silent as if he cannot hurt anyone but his body is full of venom. If not for the grace of God we would have lost the primaries. Did you not see his face during the primaries? Like someone who was holding in a fart.
The senator burst into laughter on the phone.
—This is not a laughing matter o. And now the snake thinks he can get us by changing the currency so that we won’t have money to spend during elections. Someone should tell him we have dollars. We have pounds. We have euros. Even CFA sef, we have. Is it not poor Nigerians? If we give them Ghana Cedi sef, they will collect.
Bola is done having his meal and has moved into another room to have a meeting with some southwest leaders. Remi leans back into the gold-rimmed chair in the palatial living room where she also receives guests. She has a rare moment of respite, having earlier finished meetings with the women leaders of her senatorial district. There is another meeting in 45 minutes but she just wants to lie down and sleep. She pushes back her head tie to reach an itch on her scalp. She calls out for one of her housemaids. The remote control is not anywhere within sight and she cannot be bothered to look for it.
—Where is the remote?
The housemaid runs toward her and picks up two black remote controls right beside her and curtsies as she hands them to her. Remi yawns as she flips through the DSTV channels. There is an Aljazeera report about the Nigerian elections and as soon as her husband comes on, she changes the channel. These 45 minutes are precious and she will not waste them listening to some journalist who might end up ruining her mood. She switches to Africa Magic Yoruba and begins to doze off. Her aides know to wake her up a few minutes before her next meeting. She knows she can keep them waiting because they are members of the State House of Assembly who are paying her a courtesy call to update her on all the work they are doing to deliver their constituencies when the time comes to elect her husband. Because it is his time, his turn, his right to take over power from the man her husband put there eight years ago.
ATIKU ABUBAKAR
Atiku adjusts his rimless glasses as his eyes settle on Nasir Elrufai’s latest broadcast. He turns up the volume, leans back, and drags the iPad off the table to his lap. His mouth widens and he shakes his head as he hears the words.
“Toh fa!” he exclaims loudly, bringing his closest aide running to his side, with his first son in tow. He waves them to him but motions with his fingers for them to be silent. They lean over on either side of his shoulder to watch the broadcast. Then the words come:
“On behalf of the government of Kaduna State, I wish to assure you, none of you will lose the money you have in old notes. Let no artificial or illegal deadline frighten you. Whether you live in towns, villages or in isolated rural communities do not feel stampeded to deposit your old notes into the banks. Hold onto them. Continue to use them as legal tender... the law is on your side.”
They all burst into laughter, his son running off into the corner to hold onto a curtain while he laughs. Atiku takes off his glasses and wipes a tear forming in the corner of his eyes.
—Rijiya ta bayar, guga ta hana, the aide says through tears. The well has given but the pail rejects.
—Shi ya sa aka ce, idan ka ga mugu a rana, kada ka kawo shi inuwa, Atiku’s son says, referring to Buhari’s acceptance of Elrufai even after a history of insults in the press.
If you see a wicked man in the sun, do not invite him to the shade. Atiku nods at the wisdom of his son and responds:
—I warned some of these people about Elrufai. I brought him into government and I know how he betrayed me. It is those who think he can change who have themselves to blame.
One of his aides had tried to put up a tweet with a photo of Nasir Elrufai kneeling on the ground to greet Atiku when he had not yet felt so emboldened to publicly call him names. Atiku had said a resounding no.
—Nasir has an unlimited appetite for conflict, he had told them. And I refuse to join words with someone…a small boy I brought into government.
Every few weeks his aide feels like using a burner account to tweet the photo but he resists because he respects his principal. He resists the urge to respond to the people who call his boss a thief, who ask him how Atiku became mega-wealthy when he was just a public servant; how he was able to buy a university, able to build factories, companies, and industries. He resists the urge to call strangers online unprintable names when they tag him in quotes by President Obasanjo in his trilogy My Watch. Obasanjo had linked Atiku, his Vice President for 8 years, to the embezzlement of at least a total of 145 million dollars for the Petroleum Technology Development Fund among other corrupt dealings. He resists the urge because he knows he will lose his job if he says what he really wants to say, just like the aides of all the other presidential aspirants are allowed to do online.
GENERAL BUHARI
It is two in the morning, that darkest period before dawn, hours before the sun casts its first shadows. General Buhari is angry, his stomach in knots over what the morning will bring, over which direction the shadows will fall over his increasingly unpopular image. He had been told earlier that the clumsy Central Bank governor —who'd ignominiously tried to run for president while in his current post — was still unable to meet the demand for new Naira notes after a last-minute currency change. Tomorrow he has to give another broadcast begging Nigerians to be patient with all of the hardship they are now experiencing, the fuel queues, the lack of electricity, and the lack of cash in banks. Around the country there are riots, banks are being attacked and even his party members have now turned against him, going as far as giving media interviews to say that his government is trying to sabotage their party candidate by creating this new currency change policy.
He never knows where Aisha is these days. Is she in Dubai or somewhere in the villa? Quite frankly he does not care much, as long as she isn’t going around embarrassing him like she did before he had to show her what she stood to lose if she didn’t stop letting her mouth run free in the press.
Lagos.
Lagos is his big headache. Bola Tinubu, who delivered Lagos to him in 2015 has turned the whole of Lagos against him. In 2015 they told him: Tinubu is Lagos and Lagos is Tinubu. You get him, and the 5.9 million votes in the state will be within reach. Today he needs to send the message that Lagos may be Tinubu’s, but Nigeria is his, and he can shake the ground upon which Tinubu stands. Not that he’d need to shake the ground much to get him falling to his feet. The man cannot even hold a broom high up in the air without shaking like a leaf in the harmattan wind. He wonders when Tinubu was hanging out with those heroin dealers if he perhaps got high on his own supply. Or if behind all those dodgy documents Tinubu is really a 90-year-old who just wants to be king before he dies.
He sips from a white mug on his bedside table tea that has since gone cold. He slides out of bed and sits upright, putting his hand behind his back where he feels some pain. The soft white rug massages the soles of his feet. That is the only part of his body that does not hurt these days. Eight years have felt longer than he expected and he is eager to go home, back to Katsina where he hopes to have a quiet life again. He is thankful that people who seek to malign him at least have some shame and never do it directly. No one dares point a finger at him. Not even for this policy that he had hoped the incompetent bank governor would effectively implement. You can’t even get people to do a bad thing well these days, he thinks.
A simple thing like delivering a candidate for the party primaries, and the party chairman who he supported was unable to, leaving him to take matters into his own hands and pull the rug from under Bola’s feet.
Just last night he had to travel with the man, who although on paper claims to be younger than him, looks, walks and talks like a man several times his senior.
And I am the one who isn’t well. I have never needed to be helped up or down the stairs, even when I was travelling for and returning from surgeries in London. Three minutes into a meeting and he started dozing off like a construction worker after a long day lifting steel and wood and concrete.
They want to flood Abuja with all their area boys the way Jonathan flooded Abuja with all his militants. Did I flood Abuja with cattle herders? Or cows? Why don’t these people have shame?
He thinks now of that short man he helped become Governor in Kaduna. How he now leads the charge against the president, sitting on a padded chair to deliver his own broadcast in defiance of the Presidency and the Central Bank. A governor who has no business with currency telling people what to do when the law clearly states whose exclusive right it is to create legal tender.
This is the man who used to kneel to greet me when he was still looking for favours. And now that he thinks I can do nothing to help him get back into power, he has shown just what a two-faced person he is.
His mouth feels sour. He picks up the chewing stick one of his aides got him yesterday. It is too late for a chewing stick but he chews on it anyway. When he chews, it takes him back to simpler times, to days when he had nothing to do but speak to his children and grandchildren, watch his cows, and read the papers. When he chews, he is transported to a time when he did not need that arrogant Lagos bunch to become president. He remembers hating having to receive favours from them in 2015, the private jet they leased for him, the boys who made him keep changing costumes and posing for pictures they assured him would go viral on the internet.
He did not see the need for it in 2015, but they assured him those Lagos social media boys worked wonders. Yes, they once worked for Jonathan —they will work for anyone who pays —but he hates that he needed them and worse that they knew that he needed them.
It is a relief these days that he does not need to do anything he does not want to do. Except show up at the rallies for Bola Tinubu of course.
He is thankful for the silence. His young aides are so used to all this noise, noise from the chatter of people going in and out, noise from their cell phones, and noise from the many screens in the room. He just holds the silence in the palm of his hand now, because tomorrow he has to be on the road again pretending to like his party candidate, raising the man’s trembling hand in front of crowds ferried to stadiums in buses by the state governors and party leaders. He has to tell the crowds that they should vote for a man who is significantly worse looking than he is, significantly less coherent, and with significantly more baggage.
Thank God this will all soon be over. A few more weeks and I will be back in Katsina with my cows. Cows don’t judge you. Cows don’t lie to you. Cows don’t embarrass you in the media. Cows don’t pretend they love you and scheme against you once you have turned your back.
There is a slight tap on his door. There is only one person allowed to tap on his bedroom door. His private secretary.
“Enter!” He says in a low gruff voice.
The secretary walks in like a thief tiptoeing around a house.
Your excellency, I hope I didn’t wake you.
The General does not turn or even lift his head. He has warned them about doing this, about interrupting his period of rest. It better be that part of the villa is on fire or some country has attacked us, he thinks.
“Mhhmm?” He grunts.
“Your excellency sir I just need you to see this,” the secretary says stretching out his iPad.
“Show it to Garba,” the General says, still not looking at the iPad.
“I already did and he asked me to bring it here.”
Slowly he lifts his head, and receives the iPad with his right hand from the secretary who bows and curtsies at the same time.
“What am I supposed to see here?”
The secretary looks at the screen and points to the photo his wife has just posted on Instagram, a screenshot of a fake news post asking Nigerians to do the opposite of what he ordered in a broadcast just a few days ago.
The General raises the iPad closer to his face. If he is disgusted, there is no sign on his face to show it. He feels blood coursing faster through his veins.
—This woman won’t kill me, he thinks and asks his secretary to get Mamman Daura, his uncle, who is recuperating in London, on the phone.
YEMI OSINBAJO
Pastor Yemi wakes up with a sharp pain in his chest, sometimes on the left side, sometimes in the middle, a pain he has felt since June 7, 2022, when it became clear how big of a miscalculation he had made. In all of his 65 years, he cannot remember being so publicly and thoroughly humiliated, not even in any of the high-profile cases he lost when he practised as a lawyer or even as Attorney General of Lagos State.
His office has been like a coordination centre for post-war reconstruction, except that there is no real reconstruction possible. The war is over and they are burying the dead, the fallen. His engagements have been reduced by half and he barely shows his face in public anymore, not even now that his party, the incumbent, is struggling in the polls. Party members have tweeted at him.
Where are you, sir? We need you now sir. Please tell your supporters to come out and vote for Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. #BAT2023
Vice Presidents in Nigeria have always struggled to be relevant since Obasanjo realised the mistake of having a prominent deputy and moved to destroy his influence and power, so thoroughly that Atiku Abubakar, who thought he controlled the party was unable to secure the party nomination to succeed his boss.
His private number, the one only close friends and family have, rings nonstop. Most of the time, he glances at the screen and lets it ring out. He does not know who to trust, and who to believe. Every smile now appears sinister and nothing makes sense anymore. Why did he believe that the General wanted him to become president?
The General had smiled and nodded when he went to ask for his support and blessing to run for office.
—Are you going to investigate me when you become president, the General had joked in one of those rare moments when he comes alive and takes charge of the room.
Yemi, pleasantly surprised by the joke had doubled over, laughing, making him even smaller than he already was, almost disappearing into the chair in which he sat.
—Your Excellency has an amazing sense of humour. When I tell people they never believe me.
—I am used to people thinking I am wicked, since my days in the army.
Every second example General Buhari gives is about his time in the army, so much so that Yemi sometimes wonders if he would have preferred it if this was a military regime.
—Your Excellency, I will not run if you say I should not run, Pastor Yemi had assured him.
—Who am I to say you should not run? You have been the most loyal Vice President ever. I have zero complaints.
Yemi’s heart had swelled with pride. The General was not one to issue compliments lightly. He had opened his mouth to say something but caught himself as he noticed the General's mouth opening to speak.
—You know some people had Vice Presidents that became a thorn in their flesh and they had to chase them away from the villa. As the General chuckled Yemi doubled over again, especially once he realised who the joke was about.
—I would sooner resign than be a thorn in your flesh, Your Excellency.
—Oh I trust you, the General had said, still laughing. That is why I like choosing pastors as my running mates, you all have integrity.
Yemi had walked away from the meeting knowing what had to be done. This was the boost he needed to risk annoying the most powerful man in his life apart from the president, a man who as governor appointed him Commissioner for Justice; a man who suggested to the General that he be picked as vice president. A man who vouched for him and told the president he would not be the kind of Vice President with grand ambitions, the kind that every President dreaded. The General needed someone to appease the godfather of Lagos whose help he needed to break the hold of the then ruling party, but someone who would not challenge his hold on power when he won.
Yemi was throwing a spoke in a well-oiled wheel, one which had been turning smoothly since 1999. He was upsetting the balance of things, and as the Hausa would say, ya tauno tsuliyan dodo: he was poking a finger in the anus of the masquerade. A masquerade who had made a pact with his boss to be the next president.
Yemi knew the race would be tough. But he knew he had the church behind him. In fact, the Redeemed Christian Church of God, the largest and perhaps most powerful church in the country was solidly behind him and had established a political unit in preparation for one of their pastors being the flag bearer of the ruling party. He had the General’s blessing. He had the requisite number of delegates to win by a small margin. He would have gone and begged his former boss for forgiveness because even though the betrayal would have hurt Bola, everyone knows to negotiate with power, especially in a country with such a powerful central government. He planned to assure his former boss that he did not want to hurt him. He was even going to offer him key positions, key ministries, and maybe even the chance to pick his Chief of Staff or Secretary to the Federal Government.
Now that he was thoroughly humiliated and in political hiding, the church too pretends it does not have a political department and has decided to remain neutral. Or at least pretend to be neutral.
—These pills aren’t helping at all, he thinks, as he swallows the second painkiller of the day.
It isn’t his body that is wounded. His soul received the blows. His spirit has been crushed. He cannot stop replaying the events of June 6-8 in his head, the confidence with which he delivered his speech at the primaries, and the events that followed, seeing people he thought supported him shifting camp right there at the primaries, and his boss the General not lifting a finger to help him.
His phone rings again. It is a senator from Lagos, who has been urging him to try and apologise to Bola, and join the campaign trail. He ignores the phone and picks up his iPad. He opens the Safari browser and goes to the website of Harvard Law School.
“I could teach here for a while”, he thinks.
PETER OBI
Every day he has to remind his people not to play their game.
—They will try to provoke you, Peter Obi says to his campaign team in a husky voice, huskier now because of all the screaming at rallies.
One of his communications experts disagrees.
—Oga I respect your opinion, but these people need to be fought fire for fire. They have no shame. Just leave us to do the work. You don’t have to fight dirty with anyone. But we will give them blow for blow.
—No no no, he interrupts. Look at the time that governor, what is his name?
—The short one?
—Yes. That one. He called me Nollywood actor. But you see if I had abused him back, this is his natural environment. You don’t follow a pig to fight inside the mud. That is his home. He will win there. You see how I handled it? I told him, yes Nollywood are my people. And see how Nollywood people have come out for us.
He is not convinced. But he capitulates.
Online, Peter Obi is unable to control the hundreds of thousands of people who call themselves by his name, Obidients. They will not even listen if he tells them not to attack people who attack him. They are swift to descend on anyone who even tries to suggest that their candidate is not a squeaky clean Messiah and only hope for a new Nigeria. So he controls what he can control: his inner circle. He knows they cannot get to him and they will try instead to get those around him. Already he has had to accept the resignation of his campaign director who was convicted of corruption charges. When the court handed the judgment, the team was split. Half the room insisted that he stays on as head of the Campaign. Yes, the court convicted him on 26 counts of money laundering, but there was an option of a fine and he paid 13 million Naira and went home.
“It is a strict liability offence that doesn't necessarily import corruption or immorality,” his deputy insisted.
In the end, the room agreed that it would be too much baggage and the head of the campaign himself said he did not want to become the news.
Peter ignores the people who talk about his use of tax havens to avoid taxation in Nigeria, those who ask why he invested state funds when he was governor in companies he had interests in, why he saved so much money even though his state was in sore need of infrastructure that the saved money could have provided. Every new poll gives him a higher chance of winning and now, although he is preparing for any eventuality, he really does think he could win this.
BOLA AHMED TINUBU
He wonders why the words in his head get lost on the way to his lips. He is practising for the final few rallies before the elections. He would read a speech but his hands tremble too much to hold any paper.
He cannot understand it, cannot understand how the General could turn on him even after all the agreements they had in 2015.
I have no option, he thinks, but to attack them publicly and discredit their government. He goes back to practising for his next rally.
They have scored F! F9, he wants to say, about the government in power, about the government of his party which is doing everything to make sure he does not become president. His people who should be at the forefront of his campaign. People he financed. People he helped get into power. People who he thinks would be nothing without him.
Instead, the only thing that leaves his tired lips are “F8. F. Double F”
AISHA BUHARI
—Oh god!
—What is it ma? Mrs Buhari’s closest aide asks.
She is looking at her iPad, at all of the internet coming for her because of her Instagram post showing a fake image contradicting an earlier directive of the Central Bank.
—What do we do now?
—Draft a message, quickly.
—-What do I say?
—What else? Say we were hacked.
—Hacked?
—Did I stammer? Yes, hacked. And ask the security services to do something about it.
Her aide nods slowly.
— And make sure I sound angry about it. Do it quickly, please. I have to call His Excellency before he calls me first.