Prologue: Person of the year Bola Ahmed Tinubu

What a year it was for him, and what a year it was for us as a nation. We were heading towards an election, but we could not move. We had legs, we had cars, and we had time, but we were at a standstill. Standstill was a crossroads.
Our cash was not our cash because Muhammadu Buhari and Godwin Emefiele held them. Our fuel did not flow to cars. They said they were changing currency. But the caterpillar could not become a butterfly. We were caught in transition. Poverty was defined not by what you had but what you had. A millionaire begged in vain for N5,000. A millionaire queued in vain for a quarter of fuel in his car tank.

Money failed; mobility stalled; time froze. Not only that. Banks could not dispense money. Courts, including the top court, said to release money. Court failed, too. Yams and plantains rotted in the market. Persons choked and died in bank halls. A swaggering CBN chief defied a Supreme Court.

The government of the day had the political party of the day. If it failed, its party should fail at the polls. Its candidate hinted and yelled in Abeokuta, his emilokan city. The man said it was an internecine sabotage. Persons in government were working against their candidate. But Asiwaju Bola Tinubu roared like a man with his back to the wall. He screamed, spat, stung. He promised that the foes did not know the way. He was still headed to triumph in spite of the betrayals.

His foes gloated in silence. The PDP candidate, Atiku Abubakar, mumbled an objection before he saw his opportunity. Ditto the Labour Party candidate, Peter Obi. The voter was suffocating, but they were hoping to be victor. They did not flinch to ride the suffering of the commoner to the diaphanous cloud of the throne. A cynical exploitation. In the end, it became a hope against hope. When the presidential election happened, the man for whom the people lacked, and because of whom fuel was unattainable, beat the odds. INEC chairman Mahmood Yakubu announced Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu winner of the votes. He would be the nation’s next president.

But it was the victory before the victory. Tongues were first tied before they wagged. A new storm was in the offing before he could waltz into the office. Tribe, prophecy, politics. Three monsters raised issue over issue. For the tribal titans, it was an abomination. Their man was supposed to win, an ironic adoption of emilokan and unwitting tribute to the man who coined the phrase.

As for prophecies, they failed in the words of Apostle Paul. They said his case would collapse in court. He would be arrested at Eagle Square during the swearing-in. Some predicted his death. It was hard to distinguish God and mammon. Abuja turned from a nation’s capital into the capital treasure of democracy. They sculpted the super citizen. If you did not get 25 percent in that city, you did not win. Lawyers, pundits, the streets coalesced to sanctify the city. The law took backseat. Others called for the army. It was a Samson syndrome. Win or let hell take over. At the centre was a Tinubu who rarely spoke, watching from the sideline as fury took over sanity in the land.

The politicians, especially the Obidients, reflected a part of the country that mistook itself for the whole and appropriated the throne on the basis of its minority votes. Death wish was an open clamour, an open clamour like an open sore. If he was quiet, then he was sick. If it lasted, he was dying. They had flown him last night to Germany or Paris. He was on life support. If they saw him, they watched for signs: he was shaky at the feet, his voice was frail, he was graying at the temple, he had bloodstains, he had water stains. He went to the bathroom to change his diapers. A patch in his underarm indicated a coming apocalypse. It was desperation clothed in comedy. They were looking for R.I.P because he ripped them at the polls. In tears, a certain young woman had threatened God with apostacy if Tinubu won.

But the uproar was channeled into a new hope: in the judiciary. They said they had enough evidence that Tinubu lost. The Obidients claimed they won. The PDP claimed they won, too. They forgot that both worked together for Tinubu’s gain. At the polls, the fall of Obi, the fall of Atiku meant a windfall for Tinubu. Both vote counts amounted to over 13 million votes. Tinubu had just a little over half of their haul. Though still speculative, analysts say if both worked together, they might have had their day. But history is not about what might have been.

Campaigns mounted against judges. Threats, insinuations, blackmails. To browbeat judges into a foreordained verdict became a mission. Intellectuals, top politicians, tribal chieftains, pastors, literary lights, professors, media luminaries conjoined to tease the wise men of the court. They even started a campaign saying, All Eyes on The Judiciary. It was a case of intimidation. But the judges did not faze.

Both at the tribunal and Supreme Court, the justices affirmed Tinubu’s victory. He did not only win at the polls. This is in spite of internationalising the campaigns about certificate and drugs, and he triumphed on all sides. The US courts absolved him of a drug scandal. The Chicago State University proclaimed he was no impostor. The victory buried public opinion as the arbiter of justice.

For triumphing at the polls, in court and outside the country in a year of storms, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is The Nation’s Person of the Year.

The runner-up has to be the Nigerian people who suffered in a year of deprivation, hunger and even manipulation. Cash crunch, fuel scarcity, the removal of oil subsidy, the devaluation of the Naira, the attendant inflationary burden combined to challenge not only the livelihood but the resilience of the Nigerian people. In spite of the gale of exodus out of the country, most remain to soldier on in times of crisis. They deserve recognition.