You Must Set Forth at Dawn (71 page)

An Interim Welcome—Official

PERHAPS, AFTER ALL, I AM A SECRET JUNKIE FOR A MEASURE OF THE UNpredictable, for a slight tinge of risk. Even a closet masochist? I am reluctant, indeed embarrassed, to admit to a vague discontent over my prospective return, but it is there, even palpable. Something is about to end, and I already experience a feeling akin to amputation. I know that at sixty-five, I should be grateful to glimpse the end of a nomadic imposition and the precariousness of certain forms of contestations, but there is this old man still nursing a twinge of deprivation, rather than overt, wine-cork-popping gratitude.

It seemed unreal, but all that was over. I could actually contemplate, then discuss with others, the ideal moment for our return, yet I found myself compelled to acknowledge a sneaky sense of disappointment scuffing the hairs on the old man's skin, one who was already several years a pensioner (albeit without a pension), already old enough to profit from the subsidized fares on California's railways and some airlines for a “senior citizen” status—another irritating coinage of the pseudolanguage of American “political correctness”— just what is wrong with the tried-and-tested “elder,” “elderly,” and so forth? Still, what a weird feeling it was to exercise that gerontocratic privilege for the first time on a San Bernardino Metroliner! Mentally I poured a libation for my admission to the new age-grade—a call, surely, to cease from further strife.

My momentous age-grade induction, ignored by all the world except the automatic ticket machine, preceded the moment of liberation by a clear two years. Perhaps, whenever I made the voyage home, I thought, I should be made to submit to a painful age-grade ritual since, on looking inward, I continually caught my elderly alter ego furtively drawing a dry tongue over his own teeth of discontent at a moment when I should have been salivating with satisfaction, savoring my own portion of a collective vindication, the true essence of the approaching homecoming.

Then the messages began to pour in—or, more accurately, the same message from multiple directions: the successor, General Abubakar Abdulsalami, himself former army chief of staff to the monster I had dubbed “Triple D”— Diminutive Demented Dictator—wanted us to meet. Was this a replay of the never-never Abacharian dialogue? I consulted with both NALICON and key members of NADECO. The feeling was unanimous: I should go and listen to what he had to say.

AS IF IN A beggarly compensation for the now-expunged thrill of a sneak return, we prepared for our meeting with Abdulsalami the way we had operated for nearly four years—only this time, our cautionary moves were not to thwart any danger to ourselves but to avoid contamination by the new political hangers-on. Nothing that we had inquired into remotely suggested that Abdulsalami was planning an Abacha-style act of treachery on American soil— on the contrary, this general appeared to have read the national (and international) mood right. He accepted that he was permitted just the one mission: to return the nation to apparent civilian rule and make a graceful exit. How thoroughgoing would be the transfer, how faithfully distanced from a mere surface change of baton, became the primary concern of the organized opposition.

As soon as he took over after Sani Abacha, Abdulsalami blithely announced that all exiles were free to return home. We found this extremely hilarious. There we were, subjects of “wanted” posters all over the country offering rewards for our capture—the posters had mostly been torn down or defaced, as a matter of fact—but the reality was that charges of treason, a capital crime, still hung over our heads. Abacha's men were still on the loose. Any policeman or soldier could arrest us on sight or shoot us “for resisting arrest.” In what kind of a world, we asked, was this former associate of Abacha living? Did he understand how deeply the Abacha machinery had burrowed into the normal safeguards against arbitrariness? Had we survived Abacha's roving death squads all over Europe and America only to walk into a trap at home?

Cautiously, however, we had to admit the possibility that the new man might be serious. He had the treason charges against us formally withdrawn and their cancellation widely publicized. Even more remarkable was the fact that as soon as he began to plan his first overseas trip a few weeks after taking office, he was already instructing ambassadors to the nations on his itinerary to track me down and arrange a meeting. The democratic movement decided that we had nothing to lose. And so we met at the Palace Hotel in New York City. We set down unambiguous terms for meeting—this was strictly political business, not a courtesy visit. Next, to avoid that latter coloring and ensure that we did not find ourselves trapped among the usual train of appendages who had trailed him from Nigeria to Europe, where their ranks had been swelled at every stop, and who were now virtually swarming around him in New York, we insisted that the meeting should be set for a time when he had rid himself of his train. Most emphatically, I did not wish to run into the man who had become known as the King of ING—Ernest Shonekan, former head of the Interim National Government.

When the elections of June 1993 were abruptly annulled by Ibrahim Babangida, the nation became too hot for even that survivalist to juggle in his nimble hands. Violent demonstrations—especially in the West, where the winner, Moshood Abiola, came from—compelled him to “step aside,” but not so far aside as to disinterestedly do the right thing, which was to hand over power to the elected president. He prepared a cushion—the Interim National Government—to break his fall, then named a pliant fall guy to head a nation of a hundred million restless souls. Babangida often deluded himself in presuming to understand the psychology of Nigeria's peoples. In nominating Shonekan to the position of head of state, he assumed that the Yoruba would be content with the swap—one Yoruba, any Yoruba, as long as it was one Yoruba for another! This crude gesture of appeasement only incensed the Yoruba. On the one hand, there was a president elected by the entire nation; on the other, a puppet nominated by a disgraced dictator who was bent on clinging to the last shreds of authority. Shonekan became a pariah among his own people.

Ninety days after his illegal occupation of Aso Rock, he was unceremoniously tossed out by Abacha, but even one hour in office would have sufficed for the company servant. It was still something to place on his résumé. To this today, this Egba king is probably the sole mind in our shared hometown, Abeokuta, that harbors the notion that he was ever a functional chief executive of the Nigerian nation.

It is one thing for a dog to cringe under the lash of a sadistic master; it stretches the pathology of cravenness to watch the whipped creature follow the same master around, licking his hand, whimpering for scraps, jumping to “fetch it” when a training stick is tossed, then racing to ingratiate itself with that master's replacement in competition with a hundred attendant curs in a roving kennel. After serving Sani Abacha in various menial roles, the presence of Ernest Shonekan in Abdulsalami's entourage even before the new dictator was a month at the head of affairs was a truly unsavory sight. We singled him out as one individual whom we absolutely did not wish to encounter during our meeting. It went beyond the one individual objection, however. We had to take measures to ensure that our visit was perceived for what it was—not a courtesy visit but a formal encounter with the new man at the helm of power, without any encumbrances.

And so we went into a relaxed version of the kind of security routine to which we had become accustomed when Abacha's agents were roaming the world at will. In getting to the rendezvous, for once, the restraining kennel insultingly known as a New York taxi came in handy in more ways than one; within it, one was truly invisible from the outside. Cooped in the constricted space with one's nose against the armored divider between driver and passenger, the fare is rendered incognito since the knees are drawn up to the face and the body sunk into the most uncomfortable seats ever designed for public transportation. It was a measure of my newfound liberation that I proceeded to vent, with my colleagues as captive audience but in full agreement, my long-pent-up aggression against this New York model of the taxi, also proliferating throughout the nation. No other word for it, those vehicles are rude, downright rude! That a driver deserves his protection from armed, usually drug-crazed urban bandits is one thing; that a modern nation, famed for space-age designs, one that had known the humane and commodious Checker cabs, could fail to design taxis that are considerate and respectful, yet protective of the driver, had always struck me as typical of an attitude of contempt for fare-paying humanity, as well as an indictment of the supineness of passengers from all over the world or a testimony to their forbearance. What, I now proposed, would prevent a one-day universal boycott by tourists as well as natives against such insolent conveyances? Or a blockade of the streets against them through civic action . . . It made a pleasant change to be able to launch a vitriolic outburst against a long-resented necessity that could not answer back. With a sense of relief, I knew I was already recovering my taste for earthshaking issues!

We had decided, as a base, on an Italian bar cum restaurant opposite the hotel, where we kept a lengthy watch on the premises to see who went in and came out. Sola Adeyeye, the mercurial secretary-general of the umbrella organization the UDFN, had taken on the task of inspecting the locality and securing our vantage point. I would wait in the bar until he and the third member of the team, our vice chairman, Julius Ihonvbere, were absolutely certain that all unwanted visitors had disappeared. Only then was I to enter the hotel and join the others. Wearing one of my lighter disguises, I shot out of the taxi trap— though “clambered” would be a more accurate word for the contortions needed to exit that mobile pit!—dived into the bar, and ensconced myself in the left corner by a window from which I could view the street without being seen. Adeyeye went into the hotel to negotiate my movements with Dr. Ibrahim Gambari, the ambassador to the United Nations who was in charge of Abdulsalami's visit; it was he who had finally tracked me down and arranged the encounter. So anxious was Gambari to ensure that “you do not suddenly decide on one of your vanishing acts” that he came over to the bar to assure me that all was clear and would I now follow him so as to avoid the wastage of even one minute? I asked, Where is Sola? Sola came charging through a moment later to insist that I stay put. The hotel lobby was still filled with all the unwanted and undesirable, he said. Julius followed shortly and confirmed it. I was quite contented with my position; the bar appeared to be sufficiently stocked for a prolonged siege.

Eventually Gambari prevailed on us to transfer into the hotel. The environment was not yet fully sanitized, but he proposed—quite reasonably—that we wait in his own room. That way, he could take us up to Abdulsalami's suite at a moment's notice, once the last visitor had departed. How he must have regretted his quite practical proposal—but that would come later. For now, the regret was all ours—we could not have chosen a worse moment. An elevator was just disgorging the last set of stragglers as we stepped into the lobby, and we were obliged to run the gauntlet. Several handshakes, hugs, and backslaps later with the not-so-leprous among them—even so, it seemed an eternity—we fled into the sanctuary of Gambari's room, where a few ladies, wives of some of the accompanying officials, also appeared to have found a haven. Among them was Gambari's wife, whom, to my now recurrent chagrin—considering that she had hosted me to sumptuous meals in calmer days, as she reminded me—I did not recognize! Gambari left us to our devices while he went up and down on his protocol duties.

On the coffee table were some publications. A picture on one cover stood out conspicuously—the photograph of the deceased dictator. Mentally, I retitled him “Quadruple D”—Diminutive, Demented, now Deceased Dictator. But why was it so conspicuously displayed? Worse was to be revealed. On the cover of this lavishly produced volume of selected speeches was the note “With a Foreward [yes, Forew
a
rd] by General Abdulsalami, Head of State”!

It was an inauspicious beginning. What message was this meant to convey? That the new military regime wished to enshrine the legacy of Sani Abacha? I browsed rapidly through Abdulsalami's introduction, then passed the book to Julius. He flashed through it, sighed, and passed it to Sola, who took one look at the cover and instantly exploded. His reaction was most telling of our individual states of mind, since it was not much different—I later reflected—from my earlier tirade against the insolence of New York taxis.

“Look at this! This is a book printed at great expense to be distributed to the whole world, and those illiterate officials can't even spell.”

His outburst took us by surprise.“What? Spell what? What has spelling to do with it?”

“Didn't you notice? Don't you see how they've spelled ‘Foreword'?”