{"id":13482,"date":"2017-02-25T10:53:59","date_gmt":"2017-02-25T10:53:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=13482"},"modified":"2017-02-25T11:20:44","modified_gmt":"2017-02-25T11:20:44","slug":"why-osinbajo-is-succeeding-where-buhari-failed-by-farooq-kperogi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=13482","title":{"rendered":"Why Osinbajo is Succeeding Where Buhari Failed  By Farooq Kperogi"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><code><script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!-- www.deltanewsroom.com --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-2163942495525027\" data-ad-slot=\"1411897411\" data-ad-format=\"auto\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/code><\/p>\n<div class=\"text_exposed_show\">\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/oshibanjo.jpg1_.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-13483\" src=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/oshibanjo.jpg1_-214x300.jpg\" alt=\"oshibanjo.jpg1\" width=\"214\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/oshibanjo.jpg1_-214x300.jpg 214w, http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/oshibanjo.jpg1_.jpg 591w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 214px) 100vw, 214px\" \/><\/a>There finally seems to be some movement in the country. A new life has been infused into the country. There is now legitimate reason to be hopeful. Why has it taken the ascendancy of Osinbajo to the acting presidency to achieve this? The answer is simple: symbolic presence.<\/p>\n<p>Buhari lacked symbolic presence in the 20 months he was in charge. His presence was barely felt in the country. Nor was his voice heard. It took him six months to appoint ministers. Attahiru Jega notified him of the impending expiration of his tenure months in advance, but the president didn\u2019t act, and caused a needless bureaucratic kerfuffle at INEC. A minister died in a car crash several months ago, and he hasn\u2019t been replaced up to now. Another minister resigned to take up an international job. She hasn\u2019t been replaced up to now. The Supreme Court had an acting Chief Justice for months. It took Osinbajo\u2019s acting presidency to forward his name to the Senate for confirmation.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.alternativeadvert.com\/show.php?z=30&amp;pl=12482&amp;ad_type=59&amp;rl=180\" width=\"300\" height=\"250\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Boards of several government agencies haven\u2019t been constituted up to now, meaning government agencies, which are the engine rooms of government, can\u2019t take decisions since they can\u2019t constitutionally bypass their boards in their decision making. I can go on, but the point is that the problem of Buhari\u2019s government wasn\u2019t so much misgovernance as it was ungovernance. He simply wasn\u2019t there.<\/p>\n<p>In online pedagogy, there\u2019s a concept called social presence. It\u2019s the idea that when you teach people with whom you don\u2019t share physical co-presence you need to simulate some sort of presence through periodic electronic communication (such as an active online profile, comments, emails, instructor-learner interactions, etc.) to compensate for physical absence.<\/p>\n<p>In government, leaders also need constant symbolic presence to reassure the people they govern that they are there, that they care, that they are working&#8211;in addition to actually working. Buhari visited more countries in the world than he visited states in Nigeria. He spoke to more foreign media outlets and journalists than he spoke to the Nigerian media and journalists. He comes across as very contemptuous of Nigerians, the very people that put him in power, and obsequious to, even desperately desirous of the approval of, foreigners. That is why his presence in and absence from Nigeria are practically indistinguishable.<\/p>\n<p>Osinbajo seems to be reversing this. He has social, symbolic and political presence. That\u2019s why there is some movement\u2014and some hope\u2014in the country now. I hope Buhari learns from this when he returns to Nigeria. It isn\u2019t \u201c16 years of PDP misrule\u201d that was responsible for the stagnation, hopelessness, and worsening of living conditions during Buhari\u2019s 20-month rule; it was largely Buhari\u2019s lack of interest\u2014or capacity\u2014 in governance, even symbolic governance.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!-- www.deltanewsroom.com --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-2163942495525027\" data-ad-slot=\"1411897411\" data-ad-format=\"auto\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/p>\n<p><code><a href=\"http:\/\/market.jumia.com.ng\/computers-laptops-gaming\/?utm_source=pap&amp;utm_medium=aff&amp;utm_campaign=b364e0f2&amp;a_aid=Omafume&amp;a_bid=b364e0f2\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" title=\"\" src=\"\/\/kaymu.postaffiliatepro.com\/accounts\/default1\/a72f75b38\/b364e0f2.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"622\" height=\"267\" \/><\/a><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"border: 0;\" src=\"http:\/\/kaymu.postaffiliatepro.com\/scripts\/a72f75i38?a_aid=Omafume&amp;a_bid=b364e0f2\" alt=\"\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" \/><\/code><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There finally seems to be some movement in the country. A new life has been infused into the country. There is now legitimate reason to be hopeful. Why has it taken the ascendancy of Osinbajo to the acting presidency to achieve this? The answer is simple: symbolic presence. Buhari lacked symbolic presence in the 20 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":13483,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/oshibanjo.jpg1_.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-3vs","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13482"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13482\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13485,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13482\/revisions\/13485"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}