“THERE IS NO PLAN” – A SHORT STORY

On the day after attending Buhari’s inauguration, I reached out to one of my campaign contacts to find out what was going to happen next.

Since the campaign team of which he had an important role had delivered an improbable victory, it was “obvious” that the same team and he would help run the government.

I wanted to have an idea of who was going where. As for me, I just wanted to know where I could channel my one pagers like I had done through the campaign. I had/have no intention in holding office.
My guy was traveling, and since there was no time to seat to chat, he asked that I joined him on the way to the airport.

After a bit of small talk and banter I got straight to the point

“Guy, now that the government has kicked off, we have to move quick. There should be clarity on the milestones to achieve by the first 100 days. So what is the plan, will you be taking X position based on the Y role you played during the campaign. Cos there are some one pagers I wanted to send to……”

“Oo hold on. The plan? Let me tell you what my principal (a current minister) told me”

Then he leaned forward

“THERE IS NO PLAN”

I laughed.

He laughed.

We both laughed.

Obviously, it was a joke. there was definitely a plan. Afterall, 4 years was so short a time and we would be moving quick to deliver the change promised.

It was just that a day after inauguration was too soon to talk about appointments or strategy execution. By next week, people would have settled down and things would be set in motion.

So I thought.

So he thought.

So we thought.

It then took 6 months to get Ministers into their offices. No economic advisers working with the president.  Basically, it’s been over a year now and I still do not know the plan of this government I support.

And this was not the plan.

PS: The usual disclaimer. Looking back knowing what things were, and knowing what things are, if the options were Buhari or the continuation of Jonathan’s government, I would still chose Buhari a 1000 times over. Perhaps with a lot less enthusiasm. So no, I do not regret kicking out the last government. I only regret that this government has failed to take advantage of the opportunity to move this country forward.

PPS: My guy has since returned to his business. He still has his people everywhere in this government however, having friends in government was never the idea. Were that the case, there was no need to change government. That’s why outside politics, you should have a livelihood so you can make your decisions based on principle and not on government “stomach infrastructure” pipelines remaining open.