All this 'bad belle' noise about stopping the Presidential Inauguration until all election petitions have been adjudged is selfish, divisive, selfish and unbecoming.
In the first place, there can't be a vacuum in governance. The Nigerian Constitution, as currently composed, provides for when an outgoing administration leaves office and when an incoming administration is sworn in. It does not make any provisions for any other contraption.
Second, it's so pathetic to see people who couldn't stand Muhammadu Buhari staying a minute longer in office now advocating that he should extend his tenure to whenever the election petitions are disposed off. Whatever has become of their pride as by-the-letter "constitutionalists"?
I almost puked from hearing and reading most of these fake "constitutionalists" demanding for the setting up of an Interim National Government as an alternative "lesser evil" to tenure elongation.
Let's get one thing clear. The constitutional provisions on transition of administrations - at ALL three tiers of government, not just the presidency alone - are crystal-clear, without the need for an understanding of rocket science.
The big question is: If they have been complied with on six previous occasions without the heavens falling, why the ruckus in 2023? The answer is as clear as 7-Up: Because Asiwaju Bola Tinubu is involved. Shikena!
But policies must never be allowed to revolve around the morbid hatred groups of people are harbouring against one individual. As Greek philosopher Onasander so poignantly observed, "Envy is a pain of mind that successful men cause their neighbours."
Having surmounted all the daunting obstacles put in his path by "principalities and powers" without AND within his own political families (APC and the mutinous 'Tinubu boys'), it would seem to me that not only is Tinubu living a charmed political life but that he's divinely ordained to be the Nigerian President in the Year of our Lord 2023!
Anything else would amount to just kicking against the pricks, or as an Igbo proverb posits, "Ochu okuko nwe ada" (the individual hell-bent on pursuing a chicken will invariably suffer a fall!).
It is pertinent at this juncture to remind the two main protagonists in this matter of how they maliciously want to deprive Tinubu and Nigerians what they and their constituents had benefitted in the past.
Olu Falae, who ran on the joint Alliance for Democracy/All People's Party ticket in the 1999 election, challenged the results in the Court, but it didn't stop Olusegun Obasanjo and a certain Atiku Abubakar from being inaugurated while the case was still subsisting.
Same thing happened in 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2019, as declared winners took their oath of office while lawsuits challenging their victories were still going on.
And in 2010 when Peter Obi was declared the winner of the Anambra State Governorship Election, he VERY HAPPILY swore the oath of office, even though the lawsuits challenging his reelection by Chris Ngige (Action Congress of Nigeria), Chukwuma Soludo (People's Democratic Party), Andy Uba (Labour Party - what an irony!), Emma Anosike (Hope Party) and Uche Ekwunife, were still in progress.
There's something definitely immoral about trying to deny others what you yourself have benefited from, won't you agree?
I've read folks say that it's illogical, irrational and wrong to swear in the declared winner of an election while lawsuits challenging the result have not been fully disposed of. I concede that there may be sense in what they're saying.
However, if Nigerians - not just a pocket of noisemakers - believe that this is the right thing to do, let's then get our legislators to amend the constitution and electoral act accordingly.
The Nigerian Constitution currently has zero tolerance for policies and decisions having retroactive effect, meaning that any such amendment can only come into effect in FUTURE elections. Every reasonable person knows that it's taboo to change the rules or move the goal posts while a game is still on.
Finally, must I remind Atiku, Obi and their supporters who are berating the US Secretary of State, Antony Bliken for speaking on the phone with President-elect Tinubu, that nations play international diplomacy by the rule book of national interest.
Two questions are germane in a scenario like this: (1) "What happens if we congratulate the declared winner of an election and he loses in Court after having being sworn in?" (2) What happens if we fail to congratulate a declared winner prior to being inaugurated - while other competing governments are doing so - and he goes on to win in the Court?
The size and status of the nation involved - in the context of the state of the international power polarities - usually guide individual nations in ascertaining the opportunity costs of deciding one way or the other.
I'll now leave the reader to reflect on what I've written to arrive at your own conclusion because as English lexicographer and essayist Samuel Johnson once bellowed: "I have found you an argument; I am not obliged to find you an understanding "
Let's please stop overcharging and overheating the polity because someone won and some other person lost an election because the bus stop theory is very practical in life.