By Alexander Ekemenah
Chief Analyst, NEXTMONEY
In the Manichean desperation to hang on to power at all costs, Donald Trump, the lame-duck President, directly or indirectly instigated his legion of loyalists and supporters, gathered from all over the country, who may be regarded from the outset as very gullible or senseless hordes, trooping to the Capitol where they stormed the Congress in session sitting in a joint session to ratify and validate the victory of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris as the next President and Vice President of the United States respectively to be sworn in within the next two weeks, i.e. on January 20, 2021, and other sundry matters.
The protesters broke into the inner chambers of the US Congress, disrupted the session, stole the Mace, hauled abuses and invectives at the Senators and Representatives, broke chairs, tore documents to shreds, etc. The Vice President Mike Pence who was in attendance chairing the joint session witnessed the whole ugly spectacle of acts of thuggery and vandalism.
Law enforcement agents were quickly called in to quell the rioting and protect the legislators and other government officials on the spot discharging their official duties.
At the end of the rioting, four people were reported dead with scores severely injured.
The protests spilled over the entire capital city of Washington DC, disrupting flow of traffic, shutting offices, causing breakdown of law and order, creating panic and atmosphere of tension in the city such that has not been witnessed for a long time. Washington DC is fast becoming a very volatile city where the drop of a feather can ignite mass protest for different reasons and purposes. In May 2020, the city witnessed an earth-shaking protest over the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota by racist white policemen. The wanton murder of Floyd gave birth to #BlackLifeMatter movement which engulfed the whole nation and spread to other world capitals.
The whole world was shocked, alarmed at the turn of events and worried about the fate of the transition process and the political system in the US. World leaders condemned the acts of hooliganism and thuggery displayed by the protesters at the instigation of Donald Trump.
Several adjectival terminologies have been used loosely to describe this incident: insurrection, revolution, democratic crisis, etc. There is need for precision in these usages. Social science does not permit such undisciplined and indiscriminate manner of using such terminologies without situating or contextualizing them properly. Closer examination of the incident would reveal that none of these terminologies is appropriate because none of them is applicable to the incident. For instance, insurrection is not applicable because it did not invite any counter-reaction from the government and this, in turn, was because government i.e. Trump Administration/President Donald Trump is wholly responsible for the ugly development. Neither is revolution also applicable because there was no counter-revolution on the part of the government or a Third Force/Party. It is not also a democratic crisis or crisis of democracy because it is not the democratic system that is challenged.
Rather, it is a political crisis willfully instigated by Donald Trump in order to truncate the election results which he claimed to have won but was robbed of victory. Of course, it was a direct frontal assault on democracy, democratic tenets, norms, values, and culture – in short the entire democratic system of government. This political crisis unfolded as part of a long chain of events since November 3, 2020 culminating in the mass protests that took place on January 6, 2021 aimed at intimidating the Congress not to validate and ratify the victory of Joe Biden at the November 3 election. The political crisis even took a detour through 60-odd court cases filed by Trump in various states of the country to have the election results in those states overturned in his favour – but failed in every case. The validation and ratification of the Congress are formalities which, de jure, do not derogate from the victory already certified by other institutions and/or electoral bodies. But Donald Trump could have successfully used the failure of the Congress to conduct these formalities to claim that he won the election and continue to occupy the White House against all public expectations, prevent the Inauguration from taking place or swear himself in again against all Constitutional provisions regarding transfer of power to a duly elected President.
Insurrection, revolution, etc, in the strict dictionary definitions of the terms naturally invite a response from the federal government mostly in form of martial law, force majeure or lockdown to quell such insurrection or revolution. None of the latter happened. The law enforcement agents that were called out were even seen to be aiding and abetting the rioters or protesters. The storming of the Congress was not organized around any known core insurrectionary leadership to really take over the Congress for whatever purpose. Rather, what was witnessed was a chaotic occupation of the Congress chambers for some hours before they were finally driven out by law enforcement agents. The rioters did not come with force of arms to enforce their occupation of the inner chambers of the Congress or the entire Congress premises.
As a result of this ugly public conduct of Donald Trump over the tragic incident, his Facebook and Instagram accounts were shut down by the Managements of Facebook and Twitter on January 7, 2021 at 17:11hours, in a bid to prevent the incident from spiraling into further chaos. This unprecedented action speaks directly to the culpability of Donald Trump in the instigation of the mass protest whether he would later turn round to deny his culpability or not. The blockage of his social media handles is a direct evidence of his direct complicity in the outburst of this outrageous mass protests meant to scuttle the much expected transition of power to Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on January 20, 2021.
Mark Zuckerberg fore-grounded the action of Facebook – the latter that can now be seen clearly as one of the numerous background democratic institutions or public enterprise with a strategic stake in the democratic system of governance or political system – on the following salient premise:
“The shocking events of the last 24 hours clearly demonstrate that President Donald Trump intends to use his remaining time in office to undermine the peaceful and lawful transition of power of his elected successor, Joe Biden.
“His decision to use his platform to condone rather than condemn the actions of his supporters at the Capitol building has rightly disturbed people in the US and around the world. We removed these statements yesterday because we judged that their effect – and likely their intent – would be to provoke further violence.
“Following the certification of the election results by Congress, the priority for the whole country must now be to ensure that the remaining 13 days and the days after inauguration pass peacefully and in accordance with established democratic norms.
“Over the last several years, we have allowed President Trump to use our platform consistent with our own rules, at times removing content or labeling his posts when they violate our policies. We did this because we believe that the public has a right to the broadest possible access to political speech, even controversial speech. But the current context is now fundamentally different involving use of our platform to incite violent insurrection against a democratically elected government.
“We believe the risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great. Therefore, we are extending the block we have placed on his Facebook and Instagram accounts indefinitely and for at least the next two weeks until the peaceful transition of power is complete”
Such an infamy by an outgoing US President has not been seen before. To put it mildly, it is a grave criminal act verging on treasonable felony. It shows clearly who the real Donald Trump is. Indeed, several short videos circulated on social media platforms showing him somewhere in a makeshift shelter watching through CCTV while the city was literally burning while his daughter or wife was dancing.
In another video that also circulated on social media showed a white lady by name Elizabeth from Knoxville, Tennessee, crying: “I got maced! By the Police! Yeah, I made it like a foot inside and they pushed me out and they maced me. We’re storming the Capitol, it’s a revolution”! She came all the way from Knoxville in Tennessee to Washington DC for a “revolution”. This was the kind of phantasmagoria inflicted on a gullible people by the poisonous demagoguery of Donald Trump. If she had died in the “revolution” then she would become a “revolutionary martyr”. Remember the Storming of the Bastille during the French Revolution on July 14, 1789?
Trump has been analogously compared to Emperor Nero Claudius Caesar (37-68 A.D.) who ruled Rome from 54 A.D. until his death by suicide 14 years later when the latter was feasting and making merriment while Rome was burning in rage. Early in the morning of June 19, 64 AD, a blaze had broken out in the shops around the Circus Maximus and spread quickly throughout the city. Over the next nine days, three of the Rome’s 14 districts were destroyed and an additional seven were severely damaged. Rumors abound that Emperor Nero had started the fire in order to clear a land for the expansion of the palace complex on the Palatine Hill. The comparison is probably apt here even though it can be slightly varied. It was Trump that willfully, for his narcissistic reasons, literally set fire on his country by his stubborn refusal to accept defeat during the November 3, 2020 Presidential Election after the losing the popular vote, the Electoral College vote and 60 lawsuits that he filed at different courts across the country in a bid to reclaim his so-called mandate! Trump, like Emperor Nero was seen enjoying the spectacle of public pandemonium.
Here too, the tragedy can be compared to the British burning down the White House on August 24, 1814 during the War of 1812 and during the reign of President James Madison. The Capitol was also burnt down by the British during the same period.
Shortly after the riotous disorder in the Capitol, i.e. after several hours of charged atmosphere and encounter with law enforcement agents deployed everywhere, Donald Trump suddenly conceded defeat, urging his supporters to go home and “come” back “another” day to fight. Why the sudden U-turn or change of mind?
There is no doubt that Donald Trump and his cohorts have tried all the tricks available in and outside the proverbial playbook of political manipulations to disrupt and scuttle the transition of power to enable him stay put in the White House against all democratic rules, norms and traditions based upon his hallucinations that he won the November 3, 2020 Presidential Election but was robbed of victory by the opposition. Donald Trump and his die-hard thugs, however, suddenly realized that the game is up and it is time to leave the White House where he is no longer welcome either as President or even ordinary citizen with their respective panoply of rights bestowed by the Constitution of the United States. It is not also impossible that the Service Chiefs and the heads of the security agencies could have whispered into his ears or lean hard on him to concede defeat lest he is forced to face the consequences of his stubbornness. It is also not impossible that his Cabinet Secretaries must have showed him the Red Card, for instance the provision of 25th Amendment (Section 4) of the Constitution. It is incontrovertible that his Vice President, Mike Pence, had turned against him at the last minute. Pence received bile of maledictions hauled against him by Trump. If it were possible for Trump to sack Pence, he would not have hesitated to do so as he had done to several of his Cabinet Secretaries and other high government officials.
Donald Trump has stretched and tested the limit of the elasticity and/or endurance of the democratic institutions including the American media established over the last two hundred years. Democracy has triumphed over the unbridled voracious ambitions of an individual no matter how highly placed or how he has suddenly presented himself as an autocrat of the most venal or evil kind, committing perjury against his own name and reputation and against the most sacred ideals represented by his country over the centuries.
Donald Trump, who no longer deserve his name to be prefixed with the title of President, has shown the whole world that he is not a “citizen” in the real sense of the world. While he has enjoyed to the fullest all the rights and freedoms constitutionally bestowed on a “citizen” in the classical sense of the word, Donald Trump has tragically abdicated all responsibilities and duties correspondingly and inexorably attached to such rights and freedoms. He absconded from the higher calling of a leader bestowed on him and as expected of him – and in the process endanger and imperil his country in a manner that cause breaches of the vital firewalls of national security. Donald Trump is an enemy of himself, of his place in history if he cares about his place in history, and that of his country. He is a bull inside china shop. He has to be gently eased out lest he breaks up all the priceless china wares in the shop.
The fundamental question can be, if it has not been, raised: why was Donald Trump allowed to go this far given the assessment and judgment of the grave danger that he posed to the American democratic and governance system not to talk of vital national security interests? This question is not easy to answer as many may think. Nobody can really restrain or prevent him from doing whatever he wants to do, whether legal or not, whether ethical or nor within the parameters of the presidential privileges and powers that he enjoy. He enjoys immunity which can only be lifted under extreme conditions especially when he is out of the White House. Yet the Constitution provides for situation where he can be restrained or prevented from doing anything considered contrary to or in gross violation of the Constitution, for instance if he has done anything to warrant the invocation of Section 4 of the 25th Amendment. Those restraints or preventions are equally strictly defined by the Constitution. For instance, if the President is to be impeached or removed by the Congress or the Cabinet, the strict procedures laid down for such purpose must be seen to be unconditionally adhered and fulfilled unequivocally. Thus, it is not just a question of whimsically or capriciously waking up one day and somebody declaring or proclaiming that the President has been removed or impeached.
Of course, and there may not be any iota of doubt about this: Donald Trump could have probably been pulled out of the White House one way or the other by the hotheads within the national security establishments going his graphic instability of mind exhibited and illustrated by him since the election on November 3, 2020. But pulling him out through “unconstitutional” means would have simply compounded the whole political crisis already instigated by him even before this latest misadventure of calling out his supporters to storm the capital city especially the Congress. But it was obvious he was allowed to continue to stay in the White House, tolerated with all his repulsive shenaniganisms to enable the legal process of transition to be completely fulfilled without violation at any point. This is the grundnorm, the de facto and de jure legal practice and/or tradition for the democratic process to be truly certified and completed by all the constellations of factors and forces involved in the peaceful transition of power to an incoming Administration. It is a fine process involving great sensitivity and highest responsibility to the American people and the State itself.
However, his Cabinet Secretaries are paperweights and effete. They have no balls under their pants. They have no livers under their chests. They don’t have the audacity to look into Trump’s eyes and dare him. His overwhelming domineering physique is probably too much for them. The worst they could do and which they have done times without number is to resign in frustration, albeit in polite or febrile tones, or allow themselves to be fired by Trump. Some observers and analysts have wondered whether there is a Cabinet that can really be described as one – within the sunset period that Donald Trump now find himself. They are probably correct. The remnants of the Cabinet are just part of the hordes that are his die-hard fanatical supporters who will also fade into the mist of history within the next two weeks. They are like flies that have chosen to die with the honey or cattle egrets that follow the cattle to the slaughter house.
On the other hand, it is only the Generals from the Pentagon that seem to have the balls and livers to stand up to Trump. But they too have been equally extremely careful. First, they are adjudged to be a-political and want to continue to be seen to be so and remain so. Second, they never wanted to be seen to be leaning hard on the President and Commander-in-Chief for any reason at all, especially when it comes to issues of politics or have political implications. It is not within their constitutional role or purview to lean hard on the President. Individual General can refuse to carry out an order of the President and the worst case scenario in this circumstance or context is to resign or be fired immediately. The Generals never wanted any of their actions to be interpreted as having a political undertone of a coup d’état similar to what happens regularly in a banana republic.
Congress has also threatened to impeach Trump even within the remaining days before the Inauguration. This may be a threat to force Trump to surrender in his mad bid to remain in the White House. It is, however, not certain whether the process for impeachment can be concluded within two weeks, in accordance with the laid-down Constitutional procedures before the Inauguration. No one is also certain as to what Trump’s reaction to such a threat has been, or whether he even cares at all. But going by his body languages so far, one can venture to say that he cares. He wants to leave the White House intact believing he could and would still come back in 2024. He has told his legion of supporters: Go home for now, but come back another day to fight. He believes, in his warped state of mind that he has the right to occupy the White House for eternity, that the place belongs to him as a form of political inheritance, etc.
It is not impossible that Donald Trump could be impeached and yanked off the White House within the remaining days. In such a case, he would be stripped of all privileges accruing to an ex-President. And that, in turn, is predicated on whether he would not be hounded to jail given the enormous criminal indictments awaiting him especially in New York City. But the critical questions are these: Of what purpose would his impeachment serve? Punishment by humiliation or disgrace? What really is the view of Joe Biden, the President-Elect, on such a sensitive matter? Does he want to take over power after a outgoing President is impeached just few days to the Inauguration? Does America really want an impeached President on its modern record? Joe Biden later revealed that it is up to the Congress authorities to decide whether to impeach him or not. This means that he (Joe Biden) is ambivalent about such an impeachment. He does not care whether he is impeached or not. Donald Trump has evidently forfeited all respects that he deserves from an incoming President.
In our view, there is really no point in impeaching him now. If Donald Trump has been so far tolerated and endured up till this moment, even with his mental state of health or sickness of mind that has not been properly diagnosed up till now as have been widely speculated, he can still be tolerated and endured for the next few days. Trump has been wittingly or unwittingly allowed by all forces involved in this epic or epochal political turmoil or fiasco – no American is really exempted in this regard – to stay up till this moment in the White House with all his charlatans and shenanigans to inflict all the damages on the governance space, fouling everywhere and desecrating all the sacred traditions that he was capable of. All Americans are collectively guilty over this malfeasance or infamy. The damages have been done. There is no need crying over spilt milk. It is medicine after death! Good-willed Americans did not rise up against Trump and say enough is enough and put a full stop to all his shenaniganisms once and for all. On the contrary, it is precisely the bad-willed (forgive the clumsy adjectives) Americans that have been unabashedly matching up and down for their man: Donald J. Trump, an uncrowned Emperor of America!
Donald Trump says he will not attend the Inauguration on January 20, 2021. “To all those who have asked: I will not be going to the Inauguration on January 20th”, Donald J. Trump said on his Twitter handle on Friday, January 8, 2021, a Twitter handle that has been temporarily restored back to him but not his Facebook and Instagram accounts. So be it if he says he is not attending the Inauguration! Is it really a big deal considering the crisis he had caused so far? What is the sense of attending a ceremony when in his inner state of mind; he would not be happy or connected with the events happening around him during the occasion? The most important things are that he is leaving the White House that day, whether he likes it or not; and by mid-day of that day too, he would have to surrender the Nuclear Code pad with him, whether he likes it or not. And if he doesn’t want to surrender it, according to normal protocols and procedures, he may as well keep the pad, which would of course be automatically and immediately neutralized and rendered ineffective even before he leaves the White House for the last time. It is the end of a tumultuous era, the type the US has not witnessed in its chequered history as a post-Westphalian modern Nation-State. He would no longer fly in Air Force One, fly in Marine One and ride Liberty, the official limousine. Henceforth, he can only visit the White House as a guest and upon invitation!
President-Elect Joe Biden also said it would be a “good thing” if Donald Trump does not even attempt to attend the Inauguration ceremony. But Vice President Mike Pence would be welcomed. This is the kind of contempt and opprobrium that Donald Trump has heaped upon himself over his misguided ambitions.
Thus, it can be interpreted that Donald Trump has been tolerated so far just to ease him gently out of the White House and move on with the task of repairing the enormous damage that he has caused so far. America and good-willed Americans have clearly burnt their fingers with the election of Donald Trump in 2016. America, by exercising the utmost discretion, caution or forbearance for Trump is simply trying to protect America from the ravages of Donald Trump and from falling over the cliff – ravages that have apparently become graver than the coronavirus plague or pestilence. Trump has, however, unleashed revanchist or recidivist forces that will take some time to pacify. His supporters are baying for blood and chaos. The mad dogs and the furies have been let out of the bowel of America where they have hitherto resided over the years beyond the imagination of Americans. He plunged his country into a surreal darkness the type that has never been witnessed in its chequered history.
A more situational awareness of this sordid development throws up two germane matters. The first is the various interpretations given to the development from the lens of racial divide in the US. Commentators draw attention to the kid gloves with which the protesters were treated which enabled them to go scot free without physical or legal sanctions from the law enforcement agents deployed to quell the rioting. In sharp contrast, attention was drawn to the harsh treatments often meted out to African-Americans whenever they were provoked or dared to protest on any issue bothering them in the past which also come to form part of the historical legacy of burden on the soul of the nation most especially on the justice system in the US.
Michele Obama, former FLOTUS, shared her feelings in a write-up that was widely circulated on social media. She expressed her outrage about what has happened. In summary, her write-up was simply litany of lamentations and the helplessness that has come to accompany these lamentations.
But what most analysts and commentators forget is that the mostly white protesters this time around have the protection of a grandmaster still in the White House who still calls the shots. Of course, one is not unaware of the enormous responsibilities of the law enforcement officials who should have discharged their constitutional responsibilities professionally without fear or favour, let or hindrance. Unfortunately, these law enforcement officials such as the Chief Police Officer of the District of Columbia failed ignobly in the discharge of their duties. The CPO resigned in shame after the Congress authorities (especially the House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi) leaned hard on him, threatening that he would eventually be sacked immediately after the Inauguration. He failed at his assigned duty post in the most shameful manner. But the damage has already been done.
One is not unaware of the political dilemma, handicap or obstacles faced by Obama Administration when confronted by series of racially-motivated attacks on African-Americans during his time. These attacks were not directly politically motivated but have their direct racial undertones tightly by white supremacists and other madcaps. President Obama was slow in responding to the attacks, if at all in some cases, principally because he was extremely sensitive about what would be the interpretations of his responses based upon the fact of his own skin colour. President Obama wanted to avoid at all costs all impressions, perceptions and interpretations whether expressed or not that will make him feel or make people believe that he was siding with his fellow African-Americans in these tragic attacks. Yet he was pained by each and all of these attacks. This was a very powerful sociological and political factor or variable in the determination of the normative value inherent in his responses or non-responses – the very same factor or variable that is not considered at all by Donald Trump because he does not care whether African-American are dying on their own or being killed by white madcaps since in his innermost recess of mind, they are of little consequential normative value as human beings. But the latest mass protests and storming of the Congress was unarguably politically-motivated by a frustrated outgoing President, Donald Trump.
The second matter arising is the interrogation and appreciation of the coverage of the protest by American Media in comparison with what happened here in Nigeria in October 2020 with #EndSARS protest. From the various social media platforms and individual conversation with people around us, it was clear that there was bitterness about alleged double-standard displayed by American Media over the riot in America in comparison with what happened in Nigeria last year October.
But what most of the grumblers and critics seem to forget is quite many. First, there is no universal media standard even within the concept and framework of free press. Second, there is also no universal moral code or standard by which comparison can be made in this context. Third, American and Nigeria Media operates by different standards albeit the omnibus freedom of the press and howbeit that Nigeria is always copying the American model of reportage. Different standards are pursued and practiced for different reasons despite the gospel from the Mountain to have similar reporting standards. Four, the American Media has built, nurtured, sustained and institutionalized various biases, prejudices, idiosyncrasies, even discriminatory idiomatic expressions and nuances in their reportage over the years primarily to sustain their media superiority and hegemony viz-a-vis the rest of the world. This is why “Western media” is often referred to as a collective adjective to denounce the inherent biases, prejudices, etc, that are felt when reading their reportage. This legacy cannot be overthrown overnight because it has its historical root in the very legacy of the same biases, prejudices and idiosyncrasies that are transferred from the larger society within the framework of racial problematique in the United States into the Fourth Estate of the Realm.
Moreover, it cannot also be denied that there have been different outputs in terms of quality, standards, metrics and operational yardsticks by the two media systems: America and Nigeria in this case. Thus there is hardly any fundamental basis for complaining about the so-called double-standards demonstrated, of course, beyond all reasonable doubts by the American Media over this evil rioting in America on January 6, 2021. In addition, the American Media was only reporting what has happened but not making any comparison between what is happening in America and what has happened in Nigeria just few months ago. None of the stables even remember that there was the Nigerian experience as a comparative empirical case study. Nobody referenced Nigeria. They are simply too engrossed with their political problematique to remember Nigeria at all.
Thus there is no basis to draw moral conclusions between the two different events. Nigerians, it seems, are quick to rush into generalization of issues, moralization and expression of sentimental feelings without looking at the global condition of an issue in strictly objective manner. It is not a sign of moral strength, unfortunately, but a very fundamental weakness of spirit in looking at the objective world outside one’s consciousness and control of events before they happen. The world is VUCAed i.e. the world is full of vulnerabilities, uncertainties, complexities and ambiguities that make it extremely difficult to reach moral conclusions over issues that are in state of flux.
In the final analysis, there is no perfect society or system anywhere. America has just revealed its ugly side contrary to what the whole world hitherto believes that it is a perfect society or system. In the final analysis too, there is hardly any fundamental difference between the so-called crazy white folks and the so-called stupid black folks when both sides are enraged over any issue. They are both capable of behaving in a way that is often tagged “irrational”. Have we forgotten so soon some of the dirty adjectives with which the #EndSARS protesters were labeled or tagged here in our media and by Government? The only slight difference, perhaps, is the different environments and conditions which nurture both sides. There are gullible and senseless people everywhere not just in Africa and other banana republics but equally in the so-called highly developed societies in America, Europe, Asia, etc. There are people that are mindless or fickle-minded that can easily be manipulated by propaganda or demagoguery; people that can easily be rail-roaded on to the streets for one protest or the other for reasons they cannot intelligently and intelligibly articulate. The white folk are as violent as the black folk, even more violent than the black, as some would argue. What is the difference between a white folk who wields an AK-47 or automatic weapon to kill innocent people around him and a black fellow wielding a machete to kill his neighbours, etc?
January 6, 2021, would be a date in the political calendar of the United States that would not be quickly forgotten. Indeed, it is already etched in the collective memory of the nation, as a day of infamy to remember and reflect quietly on the lessons of electing a wrong person as the President of the United States and as a leader of the “Free World”. Donald Trump would be remembered by his name in the greatest shame for bringing America to the lowest level of a banana republic.