Ego, Pride and Bukarti’s Unwitty Advocacy -By Ismail Misbahu

To me, the best name to describe a politician in Nigeria is to call him ‘an opportunist’. Politicians are opportunistic to every situation and are good at exploiting the weak out of his strengths and vice versa—a case good or bad.

Before I proceed, Dr. BULAMA BUKARTI, here’s a quick piece of advice to you: please establish a non-governmental organization with a business-reliable income that can strengthen your capacity and sustain your advocacy without making you vulnerable to responding to backdoor calls from politicians. If this is already an agenda in your mind, a word from good hearts would suggest you should make it real.

Opportunistic as they always are, more so Nigerian politicians, you may be nothing more than a crunchy salad in the hands of persons who, under the cover of seeking your legal expertise as you claimed, may snatch the power of your PRIDE while exploiting your EGO as a tool of deception, propaganda and a method of politicising the poor Northern (Hausa) masses. You may disagree with me but someone who’s overt and predictable like you, is to politicians, a weak character, a ‘game over’. Hold on and just think about it.

This piece is nothing more than just a simple comment, more-or-less a suggestion. I should of course have to, as you may want it, write this to you privately. I personally chose to write it publicly for the simple reason that what I would say is a comment to what you have said publicly. So, there is nothing private about it. It is what you have said of the former Governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir El-Rufa’i and I quote “… because I know better about the policy [of negotiating with bandits under this administration] than he does.” You said this in Hausa while responding to Mallam Nasir Zango but I also apologise if my translation undue your meaning. Knowing better than Mallam is not the major attention but the emotions attached to this utterance and the egotism to admit him wrong whatsoever, apparently on the basis of what you previously accumulated of (or against) him which, to your colleagues like Zango—and I concur with him—should not be the right way. No one, and I am also sure that none of your colleagues as well, would suggest or render any immunity to Mallam from the right you have as a Nigerian citizen to criticise him, just as no one immunizes president Asiwaju from your bolder criticism and later, or more recently, your praiseworthy on the path he sets to progress on improving the security situation of the nation. This suggests that the inconsistency of criticising or praising a leader is real and is judged by real-time actions at a particular moment and is not exclusive to the previous actions of Mallam supporting or opposing Asiwaju.

But there is one thing: it is that Mallam has both the right and left hands. I am not writing to campaign for the good or bad he did, for this is not the intent. But to emotionally capitalize on what comes out from his left while condemning what comes out of his right especially on an issue that requires (and still awaits a proof), is not only misleading but also partisan and unwitty. Apart from the fact that a significant number of your Hausa listeners may share your pride, many of the enlightened ones among them may not choose to care because they might already have their external validation about your pride and ego which, for me, are a long-time observation from a distance. You may need to check this with you, appreciate it and find a way to fix it. Ego and pride may be humanly common weaknesses but their degree may be unique to persons and the danger associated with them may vary according to one’s social circumstance and power of publicity. I doubt if these two fundamental weaknesses are harmless to your integrity and the integrity of others around you.

Your claim of ‘knowing it all better’—the claim of ‘a better knowledge’ and the pronounced ego of getting in a closed-door consultation with the Asiwaju government—may at best, expose both the moral and ethical weaknesses of your legal expert-ism and at worst, suggests more so that you are one of the initiators (or contributors) of the ‘non-kinetic’ policy of this administration. It may be a score from your end, indeed worth the pride of your kind, right? But this again may unveil the reason for your emotional reactions against a seasoned politician whose experience, criticism and point of view are a way too far from yours’. Nothing on the eyes of a perceptive watcher would suggest you are a match for Mallam. You have your qualities, independent possessions all of us admire and always try to emulate. But you need not mingle them with politics lest you become a target object, a politician’s dog whistler. It is good if you focus more attention on harnessing your pretty laudable potentials into private owned fora that would of course yield a better good more than the unwitty advocacy of trying to disapprove a well-known and precisely untampered records of one of the A-list politicians ever produced in Nigeria’s democratic history.

Mallam is a well-known politician, one of the founders of the APC, a daring goal-getter that brought Asiwaju to power and there is no need to prove this. He said this and accepted it as his actions time and again and everyone would agree. Yet, he also points to the fact that his previous actions cannot be all-consistent with how things turned around: “because I contributed in getting him to power, does not mean I am prohibited from commenting or disagreeing. …” We may still agree easily that this is also another brag imminent in his strategizing politics but it is in reality a huge vacuum in the thought and political philosophy of the Nigerian masses. As highlighted above, Mallam might be ready to pick opportunities out of his public declarations or TV Live programs as much opportunistic about everything (including time and words) as politicians always are. His brunt may prove that yes, as a politician, he is not always right and consistent with words, perhaps the point of Bukarti’s disapproval of his utterance: “What I would not do is to give bandits money, pay them monthly allowance or send food to them in the name of a non-kinetic [policy which is not only a policy of the government of Kaduna] but a national policy driven by the office of National Security Adviser. …” To Bukarti’s ‘better knowledge’, this is “a lie”—the gravity of which he is apt to prove.

However, if this utterance fits into Mallam’s strategizing politics as he (himself) acknowledges in the interview that, as politicians ‘they might have to use every chance, every index and indicator to win power,’ the truth is that he has not done justice to this administration and to the office of the NSA. But let’s take it that Mallam is being opportunistic with his words and he’s insincere, two-faced and lying to win his striding politics of coalition, the point here is that as a Legal Counsel, Bukarti should not, because he is privileged to have a tete-a-tete with Asiwaju government, pick the same political card and ‘win a case against’ Mallam. Whether Bukarti has this ‘better knowledge’ or not, there’s the need to firstly admit suspicion especially since there is a ground on which the ‘liar’ claims he has evidence to prove his truth. He should not contest the procedure to chase after the evidence and prove the lies or the truths. If and when this procedure is evaded, going to the extent of suggesting so early that Mallam should be arrested in case he couldn’t provide the evidence may tell us that, aside the gravity of Mallam’s lies, Bukarti has more of backdoor tales to tell than his doubtful claim of having nothing personal with him.

The call here is to DR. BULAMA BUKARTI: this should not be your way. I doubt if there is no limitation to which advocacy can interact with an issue that requires judicial proof. Mallam says he has his evidence, then lets the law call for it. I also hope that Dr. Bukarti understands the lane from which I am driving my points towards his direction. I am not at all a nincompoop of Mallam’s politics, neither am I enough to become his surrogate defender. I frankly have the knowledge and orientation to stay away from indulging in partisan politics in both words and actions. But this is just advice, as simple and respectful as my words clearly suggest. Besides, I am a fan of your social media Hausa live program: Fashin Baki and for quite some time, I have been staying in touch with you every Sundays of the week bar possibly moments when personal engagements turn me busy. As you follow, observe, analyse and share your views about the fundamental security issues in this country, so also, we follow the follower, observe the observer and analyse the analyser on what, and how, he shares what he thinks is worth the conscience of all of us. We learn and deeply appreciate all the priceless contributions from you and all your colleagues: Hikima, Jaafar, Nazir and Zango. You all wish for the good of this country and undoubtedly everyone. We unequivocally trust the intent.

However, your good intentions do not suggest that you are anything any different from humans, as fallible as we all are. Mistakes can therefore make you stronger but only if you can come down to accept it. It might be the result of ego or pride—the two fundamental issues I personally attribute to Bukarti’s weakness. He may disagree but that is what I observe for quite sometimes. I am saying respectfully that these two weaknesses of yours are not funny, therefore they shouldn’t diminish your prudence and the power of judgement. Ego and pride can easily and decisively attack these qualities. I could recall the powerful admonition of a respected Nigerian advocate, Kingsley Moghalu, who on the invitation of the last month’s edition of ‘Diaspora Dialogue’—a monthly English live podcast similar to Fashin Baki hosted by Professor Farooq A. Kperogi and Cos, Saturday, 30th August 2025, submits that ‘ego is one of the major diseases that kills servant leadership in Nigeria.’ I have reflected a lot on his position and I can see how powerful this ‘ego of things’ has continuously misguided leaderships at virtually all levels in Nigeria—not only at the level of three-tier federal structure but also among the familial, clan and lineage authorities as well as those at various community fora, grassroot associations and pressure groups.

Yours’ faithfully DR. BULAMA BUKARTI, as a positive emotional state of self-respect derived from one’s achievements and abilities, fostering confidence and gratitude, I pray and hope that PRIDE will not overwin your objective sentiment about especially the lives and security of the bulk of Nigerians upon whom you always sacrifice your saliva, words, energy and health to inform, educate, lead and guide, every day and night. This PRIDE, if not decisively quench out, can tire your effort and retire your productive maturity!

Yours’ faithfully DR. BULAMA BUKARTI, while ego is a negative self-image or belief of superiority that leads to PRIDE and a need for external validation, I pray and hope that this disease will not infect your integrity as well as the integrity of others around you.

Stay safe and pro-active.

Ismail Misbahu from Kaduna.