As one of those who had campaigned loudly against the autocratic style of General Ibrahim Babangida and President Obasanjo during their days in power, I was scandalized (to say the least) when I read General Mohammadu Buhari’s recent characterization of President Jonathan as weak.

This negative description by the retired general whose first tenancy of the state house was via a coup-d’état sharply contrasts with the stream of diatribe engineered by pro-zoning champions of northern extraction to the effect that the president was too autocratic.

While the Ciromas, Atikus, Babangidas, Sarakis and Lawal Kaitas of this world have been accusing the president of being iron-fisted – even when they haven’t been able to justify such claims – this other claim of the president being too weak is something out of the blues.

To be sure, General Buhari is quite entitled to his opinions. In fairness to the retired general, he stands out as a believer in substance rather than shadows as evidenced by his rejection of the zoning argument being marshaled by tribal champions from the north who insist that the next president of Nigeria must be a northern indigene. Much to the admiration of progressive minds who truly believe in the continued unity of Nigeria, Buhari said it loud and clear that what we should look out for in the next president is competence and not state of origin.

But competence does not have to be demonstrated through the medium of coercion. Perhaps there is a fixation in the mind of some retired military officers that you have to herd the people willy-nilly to a chosen path to prove that you are the leader. That may be acceptable in the military barracks but that is not the way business is conducted in a democratic setting.

Being a convert to democratic principles at least since 1999 when he first contested the presidency under the All People’s Party (APP) Buhari ought to, by now, have appreciated that in the business of social engineering there are so many intervening variables. Therefore things are not necessarily cast in black and white but may in actual fact be in many shades of grey. What Nigeria needs is a firm leader, not a Nero.

Even Buhari will concede that President Jonathan has done some things right since he assumed leadership of this nation. So much has been said about the appointment of Prof. Attahiru Jega as INEC Chairman. It takes the deep to call to the deep. Jonathan was able to appoint the right man for the job because his main concern is who can deliver free and fair polls and not where the person hailed from. It is instructive that the approval that greeted that appointment was uncharacteristically pan-Nigerian. That is the way it ought to be. Every Nigerian should be appreciated for what he can bring to the table of democratic governance, not where he hails from.

The adulation that greeted Jega’s appointment was not replicated with some other equally sensitive appointments because some people felt that certain positions out to be reserved for their villages even as they pretend to be federalists. When the history of these times is written in future, the appointment of the first Igbo man as Chief of Army Staff will be saluted as both deserving and timely. Forty years after the civil war, we ought to be able to banish certain ghosts forever.

I sympathise with General Buhari. Imagine spending the better part of your life in the military only to have to transmute into a democrat, especially with the unprincipled way some Nigerian politicians go about party politics. Comparatively Buhari is perceived in the public space as cleaner than most of his former colleagues in the military who stole Nigeria blind. But being perceived as a ‘clean’ man is one thing; presiding over a democratic setting is another. As the general must have found out by now, in democracy decisions are reached after wide consultations and persuasion is the preferred tool rather than coercion.

Each time President Jonathan reaches out to feel the pulse of the people on any matter he is accused of stalling or being weak. Then when he takes a decision he is accused of being a dictator. When political players with criminal tendencies are invited for a chat by the security agencies the president is accused of witch-haunting his opponents. The logic is that anyone who proclaims himself as an opponent to the president’s political ambition should instantly be accorded the status of a sacred cow; if he commits a crime the security agencies should look the other way so as not to be accused of being teleguided by the president. That pseudo-logic is as flawed as the persecution complex of the narrow minds who insist on defining reality from the narrow prism of tribe.

It is heart-warming that Buhari has not shed the nationalistic toga for that of a tribal champion. He has been going round the country canvassing unity and preaching competence. If he becomes president of Nigeria tomorrow it won’t be because he was born in Daura but because majority of his countrymen and women see him as a competent man for the job. The fact that he too has realized this fact stands him out heads and shoulders above the brood of vipers who want to have another go at our collective till.

Nigerians ought to try to be fairer to their leaders. When the late Yar’Adua was negotiating the amnesty programme with the Niger-Delta militants, some Nigerians accused the president of selective ‘settlement’. All they could see was the narrow picture of the ethnic origin of the militants, not the big picture of Nigeria’s continued solvency and national cohesion. One public commentator even went as far as to suggest that the Boko Haram zealots who kill in the name of religion be compensated too because they were also ‘militants ‘. How do you sustain a discussion with such diseased minds?

Now that Yar’Adua is gone, some of those who vilified him for trying to permanently settle the Niger-Delta crisis are now singing a different tune; it is now fashionable to describe Yar’Adua in panegyric terms.

Jonathan is not Yar’Adua even if his administration is based on Yar’Adua’s programmes. In the same vein, Yar’Adua was not Obasanjo. Each leader has his style. Indeed one can say that the reason Buhari is able to raise his head in decent circles today is that he is not Babangida. A cursory check on the Internet would reveal what the world thinks of both men. That is why I seriously think that Buhari ought to appreciate the gentleman mien of President Jonathan and not mistake it for weakness. When desperate people sponsor terrorists to plant bombs and government is following the rule of law to prosecute the suspects we cannot be accusing the government of weakness. If the type of summary executions that happened under the military regime is to be avoided, the only way to go is the route of the rule of law. Cast your mind back: General Mamman Jiya Vatsa would probably still have been alive today if he had been arraigned under a civilian dispensation. It is instructive that those who authorized Vatsa’s execution for “attempted coup” can now be defending terrorists whose overt acts have led to the death of 12 Nigerians and destruction of property.  Is there any treason greater than this latest threat to our security by sponsored bombers?

I certainly prefer President Jonathan’s civilized style because it is not abrasive and it gets the job done in the end. Let evil continue to be punished. But let’s do it with the kind of civility exhibited by Goodluck Jonathan.