By Mukadas Eleshin
I read with amusement an interview published in the Nigerian Tribune of August 21st, 2024 titled ‘Kwara Needs Top Voice at National Level’ granted by Akintoba Fatigun, former chairman of Ekiti Local Government Area. A beautiful interview that summarised the entire problem that now confronts Kwara State.
The one that got me thinking is the area where he stated: “The good people of Kwara submitted to heavy, ill-motivated propaganda and blackmail of ‘Se Awon Nikan Ni’ in 2019 and we can all see where it has led us’. This is one truth that many Kwarans know about but perhaps nobody has publicly articulated it the way Fatigun has done it in the interview.
The problem bedeviling Kwara today is that of envy, jealousy, and personal hatred among the elite. Those who formed the O to Ge group in 2018 were a motley crowd, unorganized, and without any positive goal or plan. They did not come together because the then establishment in the state was not doing well. They came together because they were motivated by the ‘Se Awon Nikan Ni’ philosophy.
Se Awon Nikan Ni’s philosophy was borne out of envy as the conspirators believed that how can it be the Sarakis alone that would lead in Kwara State and not them? They have forgotten that apart from two Saraki siblings, Bukola and Gbemi, all the over two thousand posts in Kwara State filled in the 40 years that the Sarakis were in control were occupied by other Kwarans not related to the Sarakis.
In the time that Sarakis was in control of Kwara, it was a government of Kwara by Kwarans and for Kwarans. Many Kwarans whose parents were not part of the elite group got educated and distinguished themselves in various professions. They were later invited home to serve in government in various capacities. The Sarakis won national recognition for Kwara State with their national network and connections. The governments they supported brought numerous development projects and laid good examples for subsequent governments to follow.
The Sarakis spent their money to help individuals, communities, and the entire state. Also, the governors produced by the Sarakis were men who had the experience, knowledge, and capacity. Even the last government produced by the Sarakis which a lot of us criticized heavily was a lot better than what we have now. I am talking of the government led by Alh. Abdulfatai Ahmed.
The ‘Se Awon Nikan Ni’ philosophy led to the election of a governor in 2019 who only wanted to be governor to spite, vilify and denigrate the Sarakis. What emerged from the Se Awon Nikan Ni philosophy is a vengeful government headed by a man who is all out to show that if the Sarakis can produce a governor, his own family can do so too. No plan or programme was meant to bring development, prosperity, and peace to the state.
The O to Ge campaign of 2018 – 2019 made it look like Kwara State people will just prefer anybody other than those supported by the Sarakis, not minding the qualification, competence, capacity, antecedent, and suitability of such candidate for the office. It is for that reason that the Governor who emerged from the Se Awon Nikan Ni campaign has no regard for the people. He did not present any set of programmes around which the people had been rallied. There was no promise made to the people.
He also did not show any care for the people who worked so hard to spread the O to Ge campaign and prosecute the Se Awon Nikan Ni agenda. He believed he emerged because there was a vacuum and therefore he owes nobody any responsibility to perform in office or deliver good governance to the people. The chicken has come home to roost.
In sixty-three months, we have seen the zero level of development that Kwara has had in the O to Ge government. We are reaping the benefit of mischief, treachery, and selfish manipulations. We have seen that the house built with spittle will end up being the victim of an early morning dew. No plan conceived with evil intentions and executed with devilish manipulations will stand.
Any society that wants to develop will always push its best hands across. In the United States where some of our ‘Se Awon Nikan Ni’ plotters always siphon our money, can’t they see that leadership is provided by the best not minding if many of the leaders are from the same family?
For many years, the Kennedys provided many of the leaders of America such that at a time three brothers who were children of the same parents, John, Robert (Bob) and Edward (Ted) were President, Attorney General of the United States and Senator representing Massachusetts State in the US Senate respectively, all at the same time. Also, Edward and Robert Kennedy were both senators at the same time with the former elected to represent their home state, Massachusetts, while the latter represented New York State.
Also, we saw how George Bush Senior and his son, George Bush Junior became 41st and 43rd US Presidents. The latter also became President when his younger brother, Jebb, was governor of their home state, Texas. The Clintons almost produced two presidents from the husband and wife as Hillary Clinton only missed getting elected by a narrow margin, after her husband had been the 42nd president of the US for eight years. In Nigeria here, Mrs. Oluremi Tinubu was elected three times as Senator representing Lagos Central district after her husband had been two-term governor of Lagos State. The couple are now incumbent President and First Lady respectively.
In all these examples, nobody talked of ‘Se Awon Nikan Ni’. The major consideration is their competence. We have to borrow from these developed societies. Kwara, as Fatigun stated, needs a big voice to speak for it at the national level. In Nigeria, if you see them carrying projects to the respective states and you have no top person to help you carry them to your state, that state will remain backward.
In today’s Kwara, I don’t see any louder voice or bigger muscle than Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki that can help Kwara get its deserved share of the national cake. We need to forget this narrow-mindedness, parochialism, selfishness, and treachery. In a more calculating and discerning society, a person of Saraki standing would have been conferred with the status of Kwara State’s ‘favourite son’ such that he would not need to sweat to get elected into the Senate. The longer he stays in the National Assembly, the more useful it is for our state.
This favourite son status ensured that in the US, Senators like Robert Byrd (51 years +), Daniel Inouye (49 years +), Patrick Leahy (48 years), Strom Thurmond (47 years +), Ted Kennedy (46 years +), Chuck Grassley (43 years and still a Senator), Orrin Hatch (42 years), Carl Hayden (41 years +10 months), and John Stennis (41 +1month), among many others, became institutions in the US legislature. Even incumbent US President Joe Biden spent 36 years in the US Senate before he was elected as Vice President.
In Nigeria, Senators like Ahmed Lawan who has spent 25 years in the National Assembly, serving two terms in the House of Representatives and on his fifth term in the Senate have become a favourite son in Yobe State. Also, Senator Ali Ndume got to the National Assembly in 2003 as a representative and spent eight years in the Green Chamber. He moved to the Senate in 2011 and is on his fourth term representing Borno State. He is a favourite son of Borno State.
Thus, refusing to vote for Saraki in 2019 because of the Se Awon Nikan Ni agenda remains a big mistake. The man has since moved on and I am sure he cannot seek to return to the Senate again, having got to the apex position in the institution. We, Kwarans can only remedy our past mistakes by rallying around Saraki to help give us top-notch national representation. We must all agree to push him forward to work for us as our national leader. We must use him as an instrument to better the lot of our dear state.
For a man like that, he has gone beyond all the posts available in Kwara State. His conduct, demeanor, and posturing have shown that his only concern now is to further build a good legacy. Let all Kwarans rally around him and leave ‘ote and rikishi’ (evil plot and treachery)
Eleshin writes from Ilorin.
