MUJICA, THE CURSE OF PRESIDENTS
Category: Opinion Published on Wednesday, 02 July 2014
05:00 Written by Tunde Asaju Hits: 190
The reason we so often return to the same place to worship
may not be different from the same reason most men pretend
that their mothers were the best cooks since Sarah. They
browbeat their poor wives each time there is either excess or
less than the desired salt, maggi or pepper desired in their
soups. My Uncle makes his protest with biting sarcasm. He
calls his wife’s name and gently asks if there is still pepper or
salt with the market hawker of the commodity. Such rhetorical
questions are the way us hangers-on found out about the
mistake in the soup. But he’ll never leave town without a
cooler of his wife’s cooking.
This is no time for reminiscing on culinary charm as the key to
a man’s heart, my suave compatriot, Funke Egbemode, is
best suited for weaving a serious story round the mundane
without losing focus. I am looking for sabbatical tutorials.
Last
Sunday, my congregational pastor was away on other
duties and the incredible Professor Contey took the pulpit. A
man of interesting character, Professor Contey had reason
during his homily to talk about how Pentecostals pampered
their pastors. He started by talking about how he was
chauffeured from the airport to his hotel in a pristine Toyota;
of having someone open the door for him and how, having
settled himself in the ‘owner’s corner’ and belted himself
down, he reached for the handle and settled for the ride to
the hotel vowing to enjoy every mile of the ride.
Unfazed about the
uproar he was causing, he concluded that
it must be great being a Pentecostal pastor. Behind me, an
African sister whispered that this is the single reason why
African rulers never resign from office even when they have
outlived their relevance. The sinful part of me nodded an
agreement (imagine that in Gods house!).
Looks
like there’s no need to count the number of grass-to-
grace ruiners that African has produced. Of those who moved
from
prison to the presidential palace, not one called
Mandela’s bluff. From pretended freedom fighters to shoeless
Joes power has turned out being an intoxicant inebriating the
simple. If you had no shoe as a kid and suddenly becomes the
commander of eleven presidential jets, a whole nation’s army,
the police, secret police and orderlies, why must you be
stopped by traffic lights?
For instance, the president
of Naija can host the entire Abuja
without any qualms. The day Barrack Obama let’s that
thought transform into action for his cousins at the White
House, he must have mortgaged the future of Malia and
Shasha for single coloured overalls in a state penitentiary and
global outrage. So, when people call Obama the world
president, they have no idea how fake the façade is. Mama
Peace recently ordered a citizen detained and the heavens
did not fall. This is a thought that won’t cross the mind of
Michelle.
There
are presidents and there are presidents. A few days
back, my good friend, Ernest Omoarelojie posted an incredible
picture on his Facebook timeline. It was a story from Uganda’s
The
New Vision and it showed a slouching Uruguayan
president, Jose Mujica taking his turn on the sitting pew of a
public hospital. If that picture had been of Yoweri Museveni,
that paper would have been history. Just ask the editors of
Nation Media who were recently banned from state functions
for embarrassing a sleeping president. In Uganda, Naija and
other African states, Mujica is a curse on the office of the
president. Never mind, until his country attempted to contest
at the current Mundiale, Uruguay is known to few Naija
people like yours truly whose best friend is a mocha-drinking
Roberto Elissalde.
If you
pray for a presidential aspirant (not Buhari, silly) to be
a president like Mujica, you better change your return route
because you cannot guarantee that they might not try to
prevent you from saying another prayer. Mujica became
president in 2010 and has been described as the globe’s
‘poorest president’ having donated 90 per cent of his
legitimate earning ($12,000) less than somebody’s daily tea
allowance to charities.
Unlike
his predecessors, he lives in a farmstead on the
outskirts of the Uruguayan capital, Montevideo where he and
his long time comrade grows chrysanthemums. His ‘official car’
is a fairly weather beaten Volkswagen Beetle and his
neighbours are farmers. His wife and a three-legged dog
share his fenceless presidential palace. If Mujica was a
Kanawa, he’ll be in the Dala Asylum since he professes himself
an atheist.
Not all
Uruguayans like Mujica. In a BBC report, some citizens
believed that a president should have some form of finesse
and sophistry which they regretted theirs lack especially when
addressing issues of international
importance. But the political
hermit has promised not to change. Don’t ask me if I like
Mujica.
It is difficult
to feed the simple on the aphrodisiac of absolute
power and expect them to remain the same. Transforming
from a man who depends on a cobbler to fix his best shoe to
being able to buy Bata or Lennard’s, does something to the
psyche of the African. Not many of them can resist the allure
of not outdoing Imelda Marcos, except that they never
relinquish power for the Guinness Guys to record the feat.
See why Professor Contey enjoyed what he called his “my
fifteen minutes of fame,” not talking of the fortune.
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...and the point is?

simply_me: ...and the point is?

It is not the people that are corrupt but the system.
You cannot give a person absolute power and expect him to act like a democrat.