{"id":93289,"date":"2025-03-15T13:56:32","date_gmt":"2025-03-15T13:56:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=93289"},"modified":"2025-03-15T13:56:32","modified_gmt":"2025-03-15T13:56:32","slug":"nasir-el-rufais-scorched-earth-one-man-opposition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=93289","title":{"rendered":"Nasir el Rufai\u2019s scorched-earth one-man opposition"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Farooq A. Kperogi<\/strong><\/p>\n

Like a stranded mariner gasping on the shores of irrelevance, former Kaduna State governor Nasir Ahmad El-Rufai writhes in the uneasy throes of power\u2019s withdrawal. His disquiet, however, is less the quiet lament of a fallen statesman and more the tempestuous fury of a Shakespearean woman scorned.<\/p>\n

He has become fiery, irascible, indignant, and unrelenting in his public expressions of rage towards his former friends in power who have isolated him. He is throwing the kitchen sink at the power structures in Kaduna and Abuja in an all-out effort to extract vengeance and to ward off potential ensnarement.<\/p>\n

The former cushy, self-satisfied, and illiberal denizen of power who was the scourge of dissenters railing against tyranny, now finds himself wielding the very defiance he once crushed with arrogance and malevolent glee. He has become an accidental insurgent (a la \u201caccidental public servant\u201d) forged in the crucible of his own contradictions.<\/p>\n

There is a part of me that loves this new insurrectionary, rebellious, activist, and intensely irate one-man band opposition that El-Rufai has opportunistically transmogrified into.<\/p>\n

For one, he is providing the first real opposition to the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration. Every democracy needs the well-aimed slings and well-informed counsel of a sharp-witted opposition to keep its leaders from sinking into the depths of self-satisfaction and insouciance.<\/p>\n

Say what you will about El-Rufai, but his intellect, erudition, and rhetorical dexterity are top-notch and undeniable. Imagine if figures of his political stature, institutional access, and strategic acumen had chosen to be thorns in the current corridors of power. Perhaps, the Tinubu administration would have thought twice before treating Nigerians with the cavalier disregard that has become its trademark in the last two years.<\/p>\n

For another, he has an opportunity to experience what his critics went through when he was a governor for eight years. He abducted critics, caused opponents to be tortured, bragged about reducing politicians he has displaced to mere \u201cbloggers,\u201d instrumentalized the courts to squelch dissent, etc.<\/p>\n

Now, he posts social media updates about his former commissioners being \u201cabducted,\u201d about the judiciary being weaponized against his supporters and his past administration, about the \u201cmisuse of federal security agencies in the persecution of opposition leaders,\u201d etc.<\/p>\n

Not only has El-Rufai become a \u201cblogger,\u201d once his favorite pejorative for social-media-active politicians he has dislocated in Kaduna, he has now plunged deeper into a lowly \u201ccontent creator.\u201d With the launch of a TikTok account, he\u2019s gone from being a mere \u201cblogger\u201d to a digital hustler, complete with the undignified ritual of soliciting Nigerians to subscribe to his channel.<\/p>\n

Yet, I am delighted that El-Rufai has joined our ranks. Professional \u201cwailing wailers\u201d like me (to use former presidential spokesman Femi Adesina\u2019s agonizingly asinine and illiterate insult for government critics) welcome him to the club.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, my joy that he is inadvertently rendering a democratic service by the constancy and stridency of his strictures against the government has not blunted the acuteness of my awareness that he is an unbearably devious, self-seeking, hateful scoundrel who is only on a mission to avenge what he perceives as a personal affront to him.<\/p>\n

As most people have already observed, had El-Rufai secured the minister of power position he was promised, his current antagonism toward the government would be as unimaginable as a cat lobbying for the rights of rats.<\/p>\n

Not only would he have been a staunch defender of every government action, but he would have also directed his trademark vitriol at ordinary Nigerians suffocating under economic hardship. He would dismiss their grievances with characteristic scorn and cruelty.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the same northern establishment he now courts and seeks to mobilize as a political cudgel would have been his favorite punching bag\u2014just as it was in 2023, when he enthusiastically championed Bola Tinubu\u2019s candidacy.<\/p>\n

It takes an unnatural degree of slow-wittedness not to see that El-Rufai\u2019s newfound disillusionment with the governments in Kaduna and Abuja reeks less of principle and more of a bruised ego nursing its wounds.<\/p>\n

In my July 27, 2019, column titled, \u201cHow Political Power Damages the Brain\u2014and How to Reverse it,\u201d I called attention to (temporarily) politically displaced whores of power like El-Rufai who pretend to identify with ordinary people in their moments of political trauma.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlso look at previously arrogant, narcissistic, power-drunk prigs who have been kicked out of the orbit of power for any number of reasons. You\u2019ll discover that they are suddenly normal again.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey share our pains, make pious noises, condemn abuse of power, and identify with popular causes. The legendary amnesia of Nigerians causes the past misdeeds of these previous monsters of power to be explained away, lessened, forgiven, and ultimately forgotten. But when they get back to power again, they become the same insensitive beasts of power that they once were.\u201d<\/p>\n

Get El-Rufai back into power now or in 2017, he would be the same villainous backstabber he has always been. He would be the same annihilator of the homes of poor people. He would be the same horrid tormentor and abductor of critics.<\/p>\n

He would be the same inciter and instigator of genocide in the name of defending his people. Recall his 2012 tweet, “We will write this for all to read. Anyone, soldier or not that kills the Fulani takes a loan payable one day no matter how long it takes” and his admission that he paid bandits to stop attacking southern Kaduna?<\/p>\n

In a September 20, 2019, article, I described him as \u201cstraight-up Nigeria’s most bigoted and most dangerous public official alive.\u201d<\/p>\n

I said he \u201cdetains and torments people who criticize him. Abu Hanifa Dadiyata, a critic of his, just disappeared in Kaduna without a trace. Several other critics are in detention. And he recently threatened: \u2018If you want to tweet anything about Kaduna be very careful because I’m watching…\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

He has a deep, visceral hatred for the people of southern Kaduna, leading to write this August 18, 2020, social media status update: \u201cWhy does El-Rufai hate and despise the people of Southern Kaduna with such unnaturally infernal intensity? He strains hard, often too hard, to be seen as \u2018cosmopolitan\u2019 when he relates with southern Christians. Why can’t he even pretend to be prepared to get along with the people of Southern Kaduna? I don’t get it.\u201d<\/p>\n

He is also a rhetorically violent man. In October 2015, he told his critics to \u201cclimb Kufena Hill and fall.\u201d At a Kaduna APC stakeholders\u2019 meeting in September 2017, El-Rufai told political opponents that death is a possible outcome for fighting him. \u201cI had fought with two presidents,\u201d he said. \u201cUmaru Yar\u2019Adua ended in his grave, while President Goodluck Jonathan ended in Otueke.\u201d<\/p>\n

He repeated this a few days ago. In my September 23, 2017, column titled \u201cEl-Rufai\u2019s Morbid Fixation with Death of His Political Opponents,\u201d I pointed out that El-Rufai betrays a disturbingly shallow humanity and a murderous inner disposition. In addition to many examples of his embrace of the rhetoric of violence, he endorsed, defended, and even celebrated the brutal, cold-blooded, and unjustified mass slaughter of hundreds of Shiite Muslims in his state.<\/p>\n

El-Rufai\u2019s latest political metamorphosis is less a transformation than a temporary realignment born of personal grievance rather than ideological conviction. His brand-new zeal for opposition, while inadvertently serving the democratic process, is unmistakably fueled by wounded pride and thwarted ambition.<\/p>\n

The same man who once ruled with an iron fist, silencing critics with impunity, now fashions himself as the voice of the oppressed, railing against the very structures of power he once upheld with ruthless enthusiasm. His current posture as an anti-establishment crusader is not the product of principle but of exclusion, making his activism less an act of courage than an elaborate act of self-preservation.<\/p>\n

Yet, even as he momentarily aligns with the forces of resistance, history warns against mistaking his opportunistic dissent for genuine reform. Should fortune return him to the corridors of power, El-Rufai would waste no time reverting to the autocratic instincts that have long defined him. He would crush opposition, weaponize state institutions, and wield power with the same reckless abandon that now makes him a pariah.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s dissenter is often tomorrow\u2019s despot. To embrace him uncritically is to risk aiding yet another cycle of tyranny dressed in the fleeting garb of rebellion.<\/p>\n

\u25cf Kperogi, an American university professor, wrote this for The Tribune on Saturday.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Farooq A. Kperogi Like a stranded mariner gasping on the shores of irrelevance, former Kaduna State governor Nasir Ahmad El-Rufai writhes in the uneasy throes of power\u2019s withdrawal. His disquiet, however, is less the quiet lament of a fallen statesman and more the tempestuous fury of a Shakespearean woman scorned. He has become fiery, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":92928,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5782],"tags":[189,25,333],"class_list":["post-93289","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-opinion","tag-apc","tag-el-rufai","tag-opposition"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=93289"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93289\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/92928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=93289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=93289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=93289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}