It is somehow safe to assume that after office, by God’s mercy, ending on May 29, 2023, President Muhammadu Buhari, the one without a known and searchable middle-name, would still, at least, be incredibly popular among his base, the talakawas of the North, maybe not nationally as suggested by his chief media aide, Elder Femi Adesina, the egbon I respect. While I won’t join issues on his postulation about Nigeria’s most adored political leader, dead or alive, at least his principal is still the MVP in the North, though doubtful if he is the G.O.A.T of national politics and governance.
In America, two presidents share the honour of being a god among their supporters; Barack Obama and Donald Trump. Interestingly, both don’t see eye-to-eye due to the conviction of the Kenya-American and his crowd that Donald strolled into the White House in 2016, trying to delegitimise the first black American president by seeking to prove he wasn’t born in America and thereby, not constitutionally-qualified for the White House.
Obama worked behind the scene and on screen to ensure 74,222,958 votes, the highest in history for a sitting American president, didn’t keep Donald in office. Now, Obama boys are back in control of Washington with sleepy Joe as the figure-head, and he can’t wait for his pound of flesh. If God preserves the duo, interesting times are ahead of them. I digress.
It is almost a given that the current administration has lost control of the economy. Even senior members of Mr Buhari’s party regularly allude to the obvious mismanagement of national wellbeing, though mostly in private conversations. Yoruba will say, eyin ajanaku la nyo ida (swords are only swung in bravado in elephant’s absence). Everyone lines up in loyalty in public, except those ready to face EFCC, after being drenched in expletives by the aburo Dada (Yoruba’s proverbial younger brother who always fights to defend his battle-shy older brother), that litter the power corridor.
Even Rauf Aregbesola, the one thought to be Ajantala (the mythical strange and different one) is now part of the cherry-picking. To him, the jail-break in Oyo State was to embarrass the administration of Buhari. How silly! From available facts from the crime scene, the invaders definitely came to rescue one or more of their own, awaiting trial. In an intelligence-based security set-up, it should not take hours to deduce who they came for. This is sheer criminality, that the current porous security system has made a common place. It got nothing to do with embarrassing Aso Rock. Criminals will always explore security loop-holes and it would be incredibly pedestrian to think the widening gullies in the security architecture would be left untapped by the growing republic of criminals in Nigeria. If anybody is causing shame, it is government, embarrassing itself. But Rauf, like Lai Mohammed, must be seen to be dutiful, loyal servants from the South. Anything short, would be regarded a mutiny. Everybody wants to rest from Bawa’s wahala.
At least to the credit of the administration, it has kept Nigeria together, if not united and in unity, at least, we still answer Nigerians, including our Ibo brothers and sisters who see Biafra as home and currently living it in their hearts. But how long can force keep the falling and failing entity together?
That answer can be found in Mr Buhari’s party, the governing APC. If the president will find time, at least after an early dinner of his favourite, which outsiders don’t know, he should do a quick scrutiny of where his party is today, while gently picking his teeth with legs on the middle table and juxtapose its crisis-ridden situation with the Nigeria, he is trying to hand over as an entity, to whoever would be his successor. He would find incredible similarities.
Today, APC is officially fragmented in 23 states with parallel excos from ward to state level and in a couple of cases like Lagos, ending with five excos.
There is the mainstream faction loyal to Mr Bola Tinubu. Another faction, packaged by Tunde Fashola, says it is Lagos4Lagos. Akinwunmi Ambode has (AACO), Fouad Oki, Tinubu’s nemesis, has Lagos Collectives and decampee, ex-Lagos PDP state chairman, Moshood Salvador leads Conscience. All these in a state expected to give the party its largest votes in 2023?
When Buhari used Villa as oju ekun (tiger’s visage) to throw Oshiomhole and his NWC gang out, there was a promise to deal with party members seeking judicial redress. Incidentally, Aregbesola’s men in Osun and Lai’s men in Kwara are in court and nothing has happened to anyone.
Now, everyone is developing the liver as they say, to lift the lantern to tiger’s face, as Yoruba would depict once-feared, now-lame, giant. Party chieftains who have been schemed out of political relevance and influence in their states, are ignoring the president’s admonition to explore and exhaust internal mechanism for conflict-resolution, of which the appeal process is part of.
Even Ibikunle Amosun, the president’s well-known enforcer, is not heeding the falconer on this. He shunned the appeal panel and didn’t go to court. Ibrahim Shekarau shunned appeal too. What should agitate the mind of a real leader of a functioning party, which the president should be, by convention, is, what are my people up to, except if they had confided in him, or in his usual, make una kill una self attitude, he wants the contending forces to cancel out, one another.
Yoruba will call such an elder, agba ti o tole (an elder who thrives in strife). The rumour has been prevalent that that is exactly Mr Buhari’s DNA to peace. They say he is one that delights victory by submission in every contest. Somehow, there is some wisdom in this idiosyncrasy. If two men call each other out, it is assumed they are battle-ready. While the refusal or failure of the president to nix the crisis in his party, may be surprising bolekaja (let’s roll in the mud as happening in APC) is a delight in motor parks, under NURTW shed. The concern here is: one, APC isn’t supposed to be a motor park, its members, common agbero and the president, an MC Oluomo. Two, does Jesus not say the peacemaker shall be called children of God. Certainly, nobody wants to answer Satan as surname.
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and then