With Ayobrown Adetunji
Prior to 2015, if any prophet had forecasted that under Muhammadau Buhari presidency votes buying, election rigging/manipulation, party chairman reckless lashing/fighting governors, national and state assembly members decamping /defection from the ruling party, herdsmen killing farmers in thousands with impunity, state party’s internal election fight resulting to ‘double double’ congresses, governors warfare with their assembly with the entire party in deep confusion and disarray, any positive theorist and political analyst would had argued it to high heavens that ‘ce n’est pas possible’ just like the French will say…but scenarios we were in today’s Nigeria, anything is possible.
We are all witnesses to the happenings and aftermaths of the last 2018 Ekiti guber poll, though, presented to us and the international community has been peaceful but fairness was thrown into the trash bin with open day votes buying and selling without a single harassment or arrest from all ourย so called heavy but not effective mammoth 30,000 Nigerian police officers and men, (a case where voters aligned with party, with highest naira notes as advertised on the election day and surprisingly, polling stations turned votes markets). The unnecessary and excessive use and deployment of military and not to mention over a thousand state security services agents with countless number of civil defence men costing millions of our scarce naira if not other foreign currencies and all of these happenings under the rightful watch of our so-called ‘before 2015 messiah’, Muhammadu Buhari’s presidency, just as the rhyme goes in my hood, ‘in today’s Nigeria ‘nko?’, anything is possible’. No better, simple and appropriate definition that explains where we found ourselves today…what a pity.
One could not but imagine that our dear President Buhari can dear fumes or be furious over a comment credited to the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi calling the ruling party APC National Chairman, Adams Oshiomhole ‘a bad-luck’, though, Amaechi denied ever saying such but in a tit-for-tat, some ministers also were not happy, frowning at the comment made by the Oshiomhole where he threatened to expel cabinet members who disobeyed his directives from the party….but trust the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed not allowing the matter to settle said any misgivings between the party and cabinet members will be resolved amicably which shows that amicability was never in the party called All Peoples Party (APC) since inception, so also, there is lack of cohesion between and within the party members and structure.
For some people in Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund, NSITF, they berate the labour minister for not carrying out the inauguration of the board as they see that as an impediment to the smooth running of this parastatal…but Chris Ngige came up with his own excuses.
With all these, Nigerians and the international community want to know President Buhari’s best description for a child born and his parents died same day, if you ask me, it is nothing else, but ‘?dachi nke kachas? elu’ like my Igbo friend would say, tragedy of highest order.
Presidency sources revealed that President Buhari was not happy with Oshiomhole’s comment where he said that if the President was condoning indiscipline from his cabinet he was not going to condone it. Buhari was not happy with the comment of the APC Chairman because it shows Buhari’s inefficiency, the Presidency source said. Nigerians knew better, but just for the records want a clarification if the statement is true or not.
It is not surprising that immediately the Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom was attacked by Oshiomhole over his defection from party, our so-called incorruptible and anticorruption, EFCC went after the north central governor with all its might accusing him of N225billion fraud, a case the EFCC’s eagle eye never saw before or turned blind eyes (if indeed it is true) as this suddenly becomes major national news headline….interestingly funny if you ask me.
Oshiomhole has made done his threat to expel any member, but in collaboration with Lai Mohammed did carryout this in Kwara, the Senate president, Bukola Saraki and Governor Abdulfattah Ahmed are forced out of their labour land through the dissolution of duly elected state APC executives, just some days after the so called ‘not good enough for the city press conference’ and the stage-managed entry of the information minister to his far away town of Oro, in Irepodun LGA, a town of over 50 kilometres away from Ilorin the state capital…political analyst and many Kwarans knew he came to perfect a malicious plan, ‘aje ke lana, omo ku leni’, just like the Yoruba adage says.
Accept this any day, Saraki is used to trouble, turbulence and unnecessary judiciary distractions, but trust me, Omo Baba Oloye will come out stronger from all these as well.
Even, the APC Publicity Secretary, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi was not spared, as he too was forced to resign last Wednesday, reasons, APC’s intolerance of divergent views and opinions in the party plus the highhandedness of Oshiomole taken over the publicity job from the Ilorin born Mallam, a case described by a French philosopher described as ‘bon exemple d’un mauvais exemple’ good example of a bad example.
On the defection of senators and House of Representatives members from the APC to the opposition political parties, though, Mr President made known his position, calling it democracy and that people are free to make choices, but with consequences as it is and playing out in today’s polity.
I cannot but imagine the INEC Chairman, Mahomoud Yakubu disobeying any court order or ruling under President Buhari, Oh My God! is that not enough reason for his immediate removal or force resignation, a responsible president ought to have compel the electoral umpire’s compliance with the law of the land, one wonders if it has been the likes of Dino Melaye that dear flout the court order,…and all these under the watch of our dear President Buhari, …after all this is Nigeria where anything is possible…I laugh in Greek.
If we still go on with same INEC leadership and the ruling APC is ever ready to deploy the highhanded security chiefs, structures and formations for political manoeuvres, then, ‘pasan ta fi na iyale nbe laja fun iyawo’, says Yoruba adage, history always has a way of repeating itself. Few months to another guber poll in a Nigerian South-Western State of Osun, will votes buying and selling becomes permanent item on Nigeria’s political menu lists? If the answer is no, President Buhari and the entire Nigerian Security apparatus should be commended, but if the reverse turn out to be the case, then, I will just have no option but to aligned here with Mama Peace, Mrs Patient Jonathan’s popular saying, ‘there is God ooo’.
‘Un lรฉopard ne peut jamais changer de peau’ meaning a leopard can never change its skin, a replica of Ekiti guber incidence is a possibility, worst still, Nigerians should expect and prepare for worst case scenarios as opined by one of my francophone friend.
The question now is, if its quack like a duck, swim like duck and even found among the ducks…I believe we all know it should be. And now that APC is in on self auto-disintegration mode under the leadership of our amiable Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, I wondered how else anyone will describe it.
