LET JONATHAN BE
Much has been said about the good luck of Jonathan, his coy smile and gestural humility. But the same man is underestimated. You don’t just move from echelon to echelon on some sort of cosmic conspiracy. You have to be doing something right, you ought to be a sort of chess player.
His last bit of luck has not come quite easily. The so-called cabal has tried to rattle him by staging dramas of the absurd. They have thrown Turai in the ring, or shall we say, Turai threw herself in the ring. All the others, male gladiators, now seem to be lurking, waiting for another fight. Power, they say, is not served a la carte. You must fight for it.
But Jonathan has withstood them. The governors, in their messianic pretensions, want him not to carry the toga of substantive president. They have even tried to play prophets. They are trying to occlude him from the race for 2011. This must be said though of the Governors. They made the acting thing possible.
But Jonathan has been forging ahead. So, let him be. He started by ousting Aondoakaa, the now unbelievably quiescent advocate of perverse politics. He set the Presidential Advisory Council with such stalwart names as Theophilus Danjuma and Emeka Anyaoku on board. Not long after, he put in place a security tour de force by ousting the National Security Adviser. Enter Aliyu Gusau, the past master of power intrigues and manoeuvres.
With these measures, the man has shown that not luck alone is the driver of success. You have to do. He is doing the power thing now.
Jonathan has a lot on his hands. He should know that, but he has to come to terms on a daily basis with the dynamics and challenges of the presidential system.
The glory about the system is that it simultaneously gives power to an individual and takes it away. It is jealous and generous with its giving. The United States that gave the world this system has since shown us its majesty and ignominy. We saw it recently in the grand rituals that brought Obama to its acme. We are seeing how the same system is putting him through the crucible.
The individual is important to the system, so let it be with Jonathan. If anything fails, Jonathan is going to have to be held to account. If we don’t move steadily into electoral reform, many will ask Jonathan, why did you fold your arms? If power consigns us to more darkness, Jonathan will not be called a leader of light. If the infrastructure, education and jobless statistic remain bleak indices of governance, Jonathan will be held to account.
That is what I mean by the jealousy of the Presidential system. It will not spare you. It is, in this wise, close to the system of monarchy, except the checks of the legislature and judiciary whose workings tend to be less grandiose than the presidency. That is why Americans speak about the bully pulpit, referring to the power and influence of the voice and gesture of the president.
A president, with high vision and charisma, can loom over the system. However, the presidency can also loom over the person. It has loomed over Umaru Yar’Adua in the past few years. He has been called Mr. Go-slow or Mr. No Go because of the paralysis of his so-called seven-point agenda. The presidency can be a burden and lever.
Such powers are tempting. President Richard Nixon fell prey, and that was what resulted when he initiated the break-in at Watergate Hotel, an act that led to his fall from power. No attempt to redeem his image helped. He even made a drama of inviting David Frost, the trenchant British journalist and interviewer to engage him in a series of televised interviews. Nixon wanted to rewrite his legacy in public. He wanted to achieve on television what John F. Kennedy did against him during the Presidential debate in 1960. Those who watched the debate on television said Kennedy won. Those who listen on radio said Nixon won.
But Frost cornered the tough guy, pickled him with questions on whether he had power to do an illegal thing just because he was president. The great Nixon chafed, looked beaten and baby-like in front of the camera, like one avoiding a tearful moment. He failed to rig television in his favour. He went to the grave a man with great intellect, energy and handsome achievements. All of these were overshadowed by one great act of folly. He never outgrew his woes. He was never bigger than his mistakes.
That is the burden of the presidency. That is why Jonathan should be asked to govern in peace. The presidential system is an invention, but it is one that will not always work for us the way we anticipate it. It is like a fire truck that kills human beings by default or a roof that caves in on inhabitants by midnight. Soyinka in his poem, Death in the Dawn, wrote about “the startled hug of/ your invention…” The presidential system is such an invention. We hug it, but we can feel some spikes and pains in the embrace.
The poem, from which Soyinka derives the title of his latest memoirs, You Must Set Forth At Dawn, also bemoans the “wrathful wings of man’s progression.”
Let Jonathan bloom. The politicians should not stand in his way. The governors, little monarchs in their states, should back off. The National Assembly should cooperate. If he is not given the substantive position, let him exercise the powers he requires to fulfill the goods. There is a lot of work to be done.

By Sam Omatseye