BY NURUDEEN GASALI B.
Mistake or misstep have no master, because we are all vulnerable to committing one mistake or the other at any given time or any given issue. Two wrongs cannot make a right is another wise saying that is common knowledge to us and for the few who care to fully understand it and guide against it, they have easily found it to be a veritable tool for resolving issues amicably. Where there is one deed or step, it is always advisable that the right step is applied in correcting the wrong which is the civilised standard globally.
Uneasy they say lies the head that wears the crown, which differentiate the leader from the led and which is why leaders, anywhere we find them are expected to endeavour to exhibit high sense of caution in taking decisions and utterances, because actions utterances are like fresh eggs, very fragile and once it drops it become very difficult or impossible to reassemble.
Such is the case with the ILE-ARUGBO Vs Abdulrahman Abdulrazak demolition saga which is trending and would continue to trend for a very long time as reference point in the socio-political circle of Kwara state.
Abdulrahman Abdulrazak is a product of a political revolution code named “O TO GE” referring to the previous administrations under the Saraki dynasty as being ENOUGH “for a new dawn to emerge. They came to town with their circus dance with bad propaganda against the sitting government with campaigns of blackmail that of calumny and lacing it with fake campaign promises of Bread and Butter, Tea, Sugar and Milk to unsuspecting voters; raising the hopes of civil servants and pensioners, on improved salary structure, unemployed youths on mass employment, students on fees reduction, Artisans and market women on financial support for the businesses; including transformation in health, education, agriculture and other sectors not excluding industrial revolution and infrastructural transformation.
Those were the baits with which unsuspecting voters were trapped and as fate would have it, the election went the way it ended and accidentally, an “O TO GE” government was formed and headed by Abdulrahman Abdulrazak, whose main point agenda of governance is the pulling down of the “Berlin Wall” of the Saraki dynasty and replacing it with the AGF (his family) dynasty which made the demolition of ILE ARUGBO his major priority and his greatest mis-step in governance less than a year into coming to power, when in just 100 days in office, other first time governors like him across the country such as governors of Oyo state, Ogun, Nasarawa, Bauchi, Zamfara, Lagos, Yobe, Adamawa and even the crisis turned Borno celebrated achievement in governance with series of infrastructural developments in agricultural revolution, road network, water supply schemes, urban and rural electrification schemes, implementation of N30,000 minimum wage for workers and increase in pension take home. For example in far away Borno state; a state that is crisis ridden and bathing with insurgents and insurgency, the governor listed over 550 newly constructed befitting edifices such as classrooms health centres hospitals in just 100 days in office when our own “O TO GE” brother governor, in almost 7 months recorded the demolition of ILE ARUGBO as his major achievement. What an irony?
I think the greatest disability of Abdulrahman Abdulrazak is lack of paradigm of politics and governance as an “attack and withdraw” politician and a serial political contestant without a formidable political structure, His group and followers have allowed the image of a mercantile to stick. He has never been presented as a product of any old political ideology tendency or a rich political background but simply an amateur politician and a political puppet akin to be remote controlled out of the real political terrain and game play by the political boot lickers that surround him the likes of the Kunle Sulemans, the Senator Ajadis and the Illiasus, now in control of Abdulrazak’s accidental government.
If Abdulrahman were to be the true picture of an experienced politician that his loyalists present him to the public to be, one would have expected him to rise above pettiness to know that “politics is like water, and water like politics, when it becomes static it turns stagnant and infested, its normal course is movement, there is always an ebb or flow, you better use the tide or get washed away by it, the wise are careful about how they deal with water (politics) for on the river bed and the sea bed is written a waterloo. Abdulrahman’s government is static while others are moving in a supersonic pace in development.
He has allowed diversions to erode him the ability to provide good governance and his loyalists and supporters including other Kwarans desirous of good governance singing disappointment songs. Abdulrahman should not be carried away by the sentiment of acquiring power alone and should equally not be arrogant perverted with power going by the adage “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely” which is the bane of good leadership.
He should remember that there are great expectations by Kwarans from him. He should remember the campaigns of “Heaven” in replacement for “Hell” for the people of Kwara with the “O TO GE” platform. He should know that ILE ARUGBO demolition is not part of the campaign promises because if it were, even the “O TO GE” would not have voted for him because it is not a democracy dividend or food on their tables, but a seed of division and disharmony.
Today he is at daggers drawn with his party’s state EXCO, same with the Jagaban /Lai Mohammed faction of the party, tagged Lagos APC, he is not in tune with civil servants on the new minimum wage, he has abandoned his major contestants during the APC primary elections. He is now at war with the two ministers in the state, Gbemi Saraki on ILE ARUGBO saga and Lai Muhammed on leadership of the party in the state. He is at war with thousands of indigent women and men who find succour in ILE ARUGBO who are now raining curses on him, and if one may add, he is in crisis with himself on how to run the state.
Abdulrahman should retrace his steps, retract his bad policies, engage in meaningful and needful government ventures that would put smiles on the faces of the people, because governance is a serious business of shaping the lives of diverse interest groups. He needs to organise and hit the ground running instead of agonising and blaming previous government as the bane of his lacklustre performance as governor as he needs to know that government is continuum.
He should also beware of bootlickers who are pushing him to fail; he needs to be himself, think wisely and faster too, because his government is not moving with the expected pace the way it is going. Eight months is enough for assessment, since 100 days performance of other governors have produced wonders. He should let Kwarans know who is their governor between him, Senator Ajadi, Kunle Sulyman and Hon. Illiasu because they are making us believe that they are the ones in charge. They are making Executive statements as if we have four governors that we voted for.
On ILE ARUGBO they are still spitting fire even when the Governor have soft pedalled for amicable resolution of the matter due to public outcry. My brother, governor should take it or should leave it, (ILE ARUGBO) is his first major mis step. And the beginning of his end.
Aside from Abdulrahman’s mis step in the ILE ARUGBO saga, he seems to have allowed his government to be stagnant with the series of wars he has attracted for himself.
Demolition of ILE ARUGBO can never be the end of the Saraki dynasty, because it can’t be erased from the minds of Kwarans including thousands of the “O TO GE” members who have sense of history to know that the dynasty and ILE ARUGBO are symbols and signature tune of Kwara politics which spanned decades before this temporary setback which is anticipating a full force bounce back soonest Insha Allah.
One would have expected Abdulrahman to use this opportunity at his disposal to start to change the narratives of the Abdulrazak family in the minds of Kwarans from negative to positive and see if you can also begin to build a political dynasty that can match the Sarakis.
The deed is already done and we are all hands akimbo as we look forward to 2023 when we would right the wrongs being perpetrated by this “O TO GE” tenants in Ahmadu Bello way Government House Ilorin with another political revolution to be code named E MAA LO. (Go away) or E KO IGBA YIN (Pack Your Loads).
Nurudeen, Journalist/Author/Public Affairs Commentator, writes from Abuja.
