Recently, there have been many suggestions on how coups detats can be prevented. Among the earlier suggestions was the one by our own Zik of Africa “ now Zik of Owerri “ who floated the idea of diarchy. According to the venerable leader, whose nationalistic credentials have lately been battered by members of the Zikist movement, political power should be shared by both military and civilian politicians to curb coup plotting.
The idea, though not essentially novel, was easily punctured by the fact that no military regime has been purely military. Further, even a cursory look at the history of coup detats will easily show that there have been more known coups against military governments, than civilians. What more, most coups are not executed by those in government. For most times, they are affairs of those who not possessing the political power, feel cheated “ or think there have been omissions or commissions that are not palatable. Like a pack of cards, the diarchy theory fell.
The argument that coups be legislated against has been bandied around without meaning. Even those who bandy the idea admit the illegality of coups, of the disruption of a political process. In the present Constitution of the Federal Republic (1979), coups are illegal “ which is why unsuccessful coup plotters are executed. And so, the only thing that makes a coup illegal is its failure. Any successful group of plotters can easily, as our history has amply demonstrated, simply legalise it, by enacting laws which only the succeeding government can review.
From the plethora of suggestions, it is obvious that coups are no longer wanted, that there is need to urgently ensure that the new democratic practice to be manned, thanks to IBBs great ban, by the new breed visionary leaders ought not to be disrupted.
Ordinarily, this is heart-warming. But from the debate, it is also obvious that though undesirable we at loss as to what to do with coups. There is yet to be, and we are yet to arrive at what step to take to stop coups from taking place.
The idea of good government as an insurance against coup plotting, though beautiful on paper, does not seem to be a solution. When does good government end and when does a bad government begin? If the military has necessarily been corrective, why have military regimes wrought more headaches than other ones? Also, why should Nigeria still be in the doldrums of economic quagmire when the corrective soldiers have held power for longer periods than civilians? Have military government office holders been tried by civilian or even military courts and found to have held office with unquestionable transparent honesty?
There is even no need going too far searching for an answer. General Olusegun Obasanjo, a millionaire farmer and former Head of State, provided the answer in Washington recently when he said that the lure and trappings of office were the motivating factors in several coup detats in Africa. Since the political arrangement does not seem to have a solution to the continuing pilfering of the property and since not everyone can be religiously transformed to abhor such theft, it would seem the coup syndrome will not end. This, indeed, is tragic.
Obviously, the biggest subversive force to democratic system, there ought to be a lasting solution to coup plotting. No solution to a crisis of such monuments has ever come without serious struggle. The people ought to fight against coups. In other words, if the people abhor it, they should ensure that no coup succeeds; they should chase coup plotters back to the barracks anytime they stage a coup.
Some people may think that it is impossible to face soldiers, gun trotting people who may have not had the chance to practicalise their professional training. Solace may be found in the position of Nnamdi Azikiwes dictum that only foolish people argue with those with guns. It may further be unreasonably argued the process of resisting coups could result into the killing, and mass murder of innocent people. These are no doubt truths and facts. But they are only half truths.
Those who argue this way forget two fundamental historical truths. Firstly, as has amply been suggested by senior military officers both retired and active, there has been no military coup without encouragement from a segment of the civil population. Often, coups are said to be the culmination of certain political power struggle. Besides, coups cannot succeed without encouragement from the civil public. This perhaps explained why the Dimka putsch collapsed. No support and no encouragement from the public, did the magic.
Historically, a people create its history and conditions under which its affairs are conducted “ even though these conditions often times influence the people. There is today no country which has advanced without the people taking actions, which sages like Azikiwe would describe as foolish and untenable. Take Britain, for instance. An undemocratic monarch was beheaded during an uprising by the people to ensure that a democratic culture was established. In the USA, Gods so-called own land, the people fought a protracted war of independence, drew up a constitution and fought a grueling civil war before acceptable constitutional and democratic practices could be established. What of France? Similar seemingly self-destructive actions were taken by its people. All these actions were aimed at creating for the people and by the people how their affairs should be conducted.
In the Soviet Union, the people rose. Millions were killed and many more millions were maimed. But resolute in the determination to chart for themselves a future they wanted, they brought down the so-called all powerful and all knowing tsars and created on the rubbles of the destroyed inhuman system, a society whose successes in science are perhaps unsurpassable. What of little Cuba, which the United States has been unable to destabilize? The people led by Fidel Castro and venerable Che Guevara simply decided not to let the Batista regime continue to hold them down. They rose up and today, there is little Cuba whose march to respectability could not ebb looked by the USA, and indeed the whole of the Western world.
And so do we really abhor coups? If we do, next time we hear martial music we troop out to the streets and face the guns of the putschists with our stones, sticks, placards and industrial actions. Many may die, but that is the price fro democracy. Beside, how many thousands/millions of people have died because of the economic crisis which our putschists have only compounded?
By Rima Shawulu
The Standard, Thursday, November 10, 1988, page 4