Pauline Tallen Again

Pauline Tallen. Source:https://dailypost.ng

After my daughter was born, I would lift her, bounce her and joke that she will achieve what Pauline Tallen could not achieve. That was my wish for my daughter. Just about two weeks after my daughter was born, Tallen’s name appeared again in the ministerial list submitted to the National Assembly by President Mohammadu Buhari. I freaked; it seemed Tallen was not done lifting the hurdle and, it may end up becoming too high for my daughter. 

Pauline Tallen is unarguably the most politically prosperous woman in the political past and present in Plateau State, where she hells from and, perhaps, the whole of northern Nigeria, in recent times. She seems to be the phoenix of Nigeria politics that will always rise from her ashes to start a new life. Even among men, there are only a few with this political stamina in contemporary Nigerian politics.  

After an obscure political life at the grass-roots, Tallen became a junior minister in the Ministry of Science and Technology, during the Obasanjo Administration, lasting up till 2007, when Jonah Jang became the Governor of Plateau State and made her his Deputy. It is one of a few such cases across the length and breadth of the country.  As the end of the Jang’s first tenure neared, though, the duo fell apart, with Jang accusing her of being dangerously ambitious. She moved to a rival political party and contested against him in the 2011 Plateau State Gubernatorial Elections. She lost. She, however, made a huge imprint by defeating her ex-boss in Jos North, a locality where Plateau’s political energy is most spent.

Tallen spent the four years that followed in quietness, plausibly waiting for the right moment. With the onset of the Buhari Administration, she found that moment. She was often seen in the delegation of First Lady, Aisha Buhari. 

While Nigerians waited for the promises of President Buhari to mature, the younger, politically naïve First Lady shocked Nigerians by openly criticizing her husband for failing to include, in his cabinet, Nigerians who actually worked for his election. The President in his frustration condemned his wife’s comment and claimed that, “she belonged in the kitchen, the sitting room and the ‘other room’.” For Nigerians who see below the surface, there was a strong feeling that political veterans like Tallen actually pushed the First Lady to openly criticize her spouse and were actually turning the administration’s door knob so they can get in. 

It did not take long before President Buhari submitted Tallen’s name to be screened for a diplomatic role in his government. It was ill-timed, happening when her husband was hospitalized.  She told newsmen that her only option was to give up the role, since it required her to travel abroad. She made it clear that, should her husband get well, she would take any position President Buhari was willing to offer her, even if it were the position with the modesty of a street cleaner. She ended up with a double heartbreak: missing the job and losing her husband. 

By the time she finished mourning her husband, her metaphorical street-cleaner job came when she was made a member of the governing board of Nigerian AIDS Control Agency, in addition to her membership in the ruling party’s board of trustees.  

During the 2019 General Elections, Tallen returned home, contesting and losing the senatorial seat of Plateau-South constituency to Ignatius Longjan, her successor as Deputy Governor. Unbowed, she went to Abuja to meet with her powerful political friends, resulting in her name appearing in the new ministerial list of the Buhari Administration.  

Critics aren’t pleased. They criticised the administration in Abuja for nepotism, preferring to give cabinet positions to friends rather than resting its decision on merit. They claim she is part of the dirty history of the last two decades of Nigeria’s political journey and that it is indicative of the ineptitude and hypocrisy of the Buhari Administration, which promises accelerated prosperity to Nigerians. President Buhari had, after being sworn for his second tenure of four years, regretted working with people he had “hardly known” during his first tenure. This is an indication that Tallen is someone he had known and proof, critics say, of his government’s nepotism and incompetence. 

In part, the success of Tallen’s adaptation rests on her use of political parties like bread wraps, often thrown away after the bread has been eaten.

We congratulate Tallen on her new role and hope that, rather than just sitting in the boat and enjoying the cruise, she will be seen tirelessly carrying the oar and pushing the boat ahead.