By Igbotako Nowinta
“On November 5, 2020, President Donald Trump who had been massively encouraged by an Armada of fake prophets based in the United States and Nigeria, to secure a second term in office saw the hand writing on the wall, that the electoral tide had turned against him, but refused to face reality; he stubbornly ignored President-elect, Joe Biden, by not congratulating him. In his lunatic desperation, Donald Trump started a conspiracy theory against the over eighty millions of American people who voted to elect Biden. He tried to hoodwink and browbeat some Governors and Legislatures to invalidate results of the Presidential election in strategic States and find him votes to overturn the popular electoral will of the people even after the Electoral College had nailed his political coffin. Trump plotted openly and remotely without any real evidence of electoral malpractices against the Democrats, but was rubbished at Federal, State and the Supreme Courts in the country because his cases lacked merits. His recent insurrection against the soul of American democracy was the latest ditch in his unending dubious efforts to subvert the will of the American people.”
“Never before have our people been so insulted and ridiculed by double talks and absolute distortion of the facts on the ground. We must go as a people to the mountain top of perpetual peaceful protests and advocacy, to secure the kingdom of electoral equity in Nigeria, because that is the only way to societal sanity. We must continue to demand a single silver electoral bullet (application or introduction of individual biometric of Nigerians to vote), that will shoot down all encroachments of electoral process, bearing in mind that the key to electing responsible leaders that will guarantee sustainable institution lies with it. In order for Nigerian democracy to thrive or survive as it is being done in United States, it must be able to express the collective value and moral code of its practitioners and stakeholders; democracy indeed will thrive here if the faithfulness and uprightness of its adherents to basic laid down principles are held sacrosanct.”
Donald John Trump shattered the political ceilings in the United States in November 2016, when he triumphed over a political hard nut, former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, to emerge as the 45th President; that way he entered the history books.
A battery of election forecasters in the United States had staked their necks that it was impossible for a Donald Trump Presidency, given his bombastic temper, boisterous character, sarcastic, abusive tongue ruthless and crude political tactics.
Ironically, almost four years later during the November 2020 Presidential Election, the very same personal and behavioral attitudes that mesmerized the electorates out of their senses in 2016, became the vehicles that escorted him to his down fall from the highest political office in the world.
As a man that has been suffering from a scorching ego which he developed in his formative years, he could not believe the reality that he had been rejected by the American people, who preferred to ride to the White House with the older man – President elect – Joe Biden.
Donald Trump’s historic defeat has dramatically brought out a sinister characteristic trait, which he had concealed carefully in the last four years, in the White House: the ability to do anything to remain in political reckoning or contention; the ability to plan a coup against democracy in the United States.
In displaying this negative character, out-going President Donald Trump has unknowingly made himself the ‘baddest personality’ of the year 2020, and a political bed fellow in the rank of the legendary ‘little corporal’, who at a time in history was the master ‘Emperor’ of Europe – Napoleon Bonaparte of France.
Coming from a highly successful military campaign in Egypt, Napoleon Bonaparte rose from relative obscurity within the French army in October 1799, to become a stunning national political celebrity as the French revolutionary tide waned.
Napoleon reminds me of the antics of the outgoing President of the United States, Donald Trump, in many ways. Napoleon Bonaparte started by planning a coup against the then Five Member Directory that ruled France. He arranged for a Special Legislative Session that took place on November 10th, 1799.
Using propaganda, bribery and crude force, he succeeded in convening a small hand-picked group of Legislators to outlaw the Directory.
Though, he was fiercely resisted by the Lower House, but, he got elected a Three Member Consulate, with himself as the First Consul. By 1804, he had consolidated his hold on power, to crown himself Emperor of France.
Napoleon Bonaparte’s military genius staggered the whole Europe, but like all mortals he reached the tether of his ruthless career at Waterloo in Belgium when he was defeated by Prussian and British forces.
On November 5, 2020, President Donald Trump who had been massively encouraged by an Armada of fake prophets based in the United States and Nigeria, to secure a second term in office saw the hand writing on the wall, that the electoral tide had turned against him, but refused to face reality; he stubbornly ignored President-elect, Joe Biden, by not congratulating him.
In his lunatic desperation, Donald Trump started a conspiracy theory against the over eighty millions of American people who voted to elect Biden. He tried to hoodwink and browbeat some Governors and Legislatures to invalidate results of the Presidential election in strategic States and find him votes to overturn the popular electoral will of the people even after the Electoral College had nailed his political coffin.
Trump plotted openly and remotely without any real evidence of electoral malpractices against the Democrats, but was rubbished at Federal, State and the Supreme Courts in the country because his cases lacked merits. His recent insurrection against the soul of American democracy was the latest ditch in his unending dubious efforts to subvert the will of the American people.
It is pathetic to recall here that Donald Trump’s desperation to hang on to power at all cost turned personalities like Rudy Guliani, a once national hero into a legal moron; William Barr, the United States Attorney- General became a robot before he resigned from office; a chunk of experienced and brilliant Republican law makers and members were made to ‘feel sorry’ for standing against their will.
Like the devious personality of Napoleon Bonaparte that tore through Europe, it is imperative for us to know the real antecedents of President Donald Trump.
Though, Napoleon Bonaparte’s coup succeeded in 1799, Donald Trump’s coup of 2020 failed. Donald Trump was born on June 14th, 1946, in Queens, New York, to a German named Fred Christ Trump Snr, who rose to become a real estate mogul.
When Fred Trump died in 1999, he left Donald Trump a fantastic fortune in real estate business.
Donald Trump went to a military high school, but he dodged action in Vietnam; he was at the Fordham University in New York City; Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.
He had been married thrice; he married Melania since 2006. Melania was born in Slovenia and migrated to New York in 1996. Trump’s niece, Mary Trump wrote a book in 2020, titled:’ Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man.’
Donald Trump who has the notorious habit of ‘ insulting people in public’ was an underdog politically in 2016, but he miraculously won the United States Presidency, promising to ‘make America great again.’
His failed coup in the United States has revealed the institutional superiority of the system in that bastion of democracy; his humiliating failure has restored the absolute faith in the power of the greatest number of citizens to elect a universal president and integrity of the electoral process.
It has glaringly shown that the American voters and people stood up for democracy and constitution, not political considerations or a ‘money bag’ sitting President displaying raw political power.
In the course of trying to attempt the impossible, Donald Trump and his demented allies used themselves as blatant traffickers to scuttle the 215 years old American democracy, but failed woefully, just like how Napoleon Bonaparte failed to perpetually torment Europe in June 1815.
But, where are we in Nigeria democratically, electorally and politically? We are in the middle of a political jungle where anything goes sadly; we are in a messier, bitter, wicked retrogressive national moral and political paralysis.
A chunk of our politicians have turned our country into a cash cow that is being milked to death; the specie of the exploited class of toilers is specially brewed in Nigeria.
Social services have worsened; plump jobs are only reserved for the children of the brotherhood of retrogression; cultism has been taken to a new height of bravado, while a ruthless circle of political barbarians are presently taking the affairs of the country back to the 13th century; to something that resembles Ghenghis Khan Mongolia.
As it is more glaring by the day that our people are deeply traumatized by the rule of these extreme political criminals; a gang of deceits, who are recklessly taking the course towards national financial disaster and endless parochial war, where do we go from here?
Never before have our people been so insulted and ridiculed by double talks and absolute distortion of the facts on the ground. We must go as a people to the mountain top of perpetual peaceful protests and advocacy, to secure the kingdom of electoral equity in Nigeria, because that is the only way to societal sanity.
We must continue to demand a single silver electoral bullet (application or introduction of individual biometric of Nigerians to vote), that will shoot down all encroachments of electoral process, bearing in mind that the key to electing responsible leaders that will guarantee sustainable institution lies with it.
In order for Nigerian democracy to thrive or survive as it is being done in United States, it must be able to express the collective value and moral code of its practitioners and stakeholders; democracy indeed will thrive here if the faithfulness and uprightness of its adherents to basic laid down principles are held sacrosanct.
As we move towards 2023, we must insist that these almighty set democratic principles are not only applied, but must be defended at all cost by all of us , to prevail over perennial political injustices in our land.
The only process of getting there is by the introduction of the ‘single silver electoral bullet’, mentioned above. For those who think Donald Trump might prove stubborn on January 20th, 2021, let it be known that once Joe Biden is sworn in at noon on that day, he will have the authority to enact the Secret Service to order the physical removal of Donald Trump from the White House.
The 20th Amendment is very clear that the ‘term of each President ends at noon on January 20th. From my investigation, no sitting President in American history has refused to vacate office, even John Adams, who was very bitter that he lost election to Thomas Jefferson in 1801, like what Donald Trump is doing today, had no choice than to leave the office in the cover of darkness few hours before President Jefferson was sworn in.
It is worth noting that the recent insurrection instigated by sore loser, Donald Trump against the soul of the nation’s democracy (The Capital Hill) failed because of the resilience of the country and the workability of its strong system.
As a most unusual President in American history, Donald Trump is most likely to be the first former President that will be sent to jail, given the fact of this insurrection and other criminal acts against the state whose constitution he swore to uphold.
It is already on record that a chunk of his political allies and confidants, who made him the world’s most powerful man in 2016, are already in jail or are being sentenced to jail.
Nowinta wrote: Where We Are, A Call For Democratic Revolution In Nigeria.
