POLITICAL campaigns are up in the air again and many Nigerians have adjusted their reasoning faculties to suit the doings of their favourite politicians and political parties. Most of what is churned out from among the peoples of the country are sourced from the thoughts that suit or should suit the reigning respective political gladiators. Many of them are from embarrassingly shallow and twisted thoughts, but this is not unexpected. People are delirious when it’s about their groups, in this case political parties, and they are often swayed by agglutinate loyalty. Scholars call it herd mentality. This disposition to life may not always be the right approach or the best attitude to such things, but people do it for the sake of class, politics, religion, tribe, friendship, political party and so on. We simply do many of the things we do just for the sake of loyalty to our beliefs and not necessarily because of the ‘common good’.
One of the fallouts of such tainted statements we hear and the warped behaviour we see during political seasons is the fact that respect, as it should be, is tailored to suit where loyalties lie. Omoluabi traits are relegated. This can be perceived in the reactions that followed what the leaders of the Yoruba socio-cultural group, Afenifere, Chief Ayo Adebanjo said about the Yoruba socio-political group, Afenifere, and why the group is queuing behind the candidate of Labour Party in next year’s presidential election, Mr. Peter Obi. When Pa Adebanjo made his position known, the Emilokan crew went into a combative overdrive. Baba Adebanjo’s argument is this: “How can you say rotation is between the North and South, and when it comes to the South, it would be South-West and South-South every time? Is the South-East not part of the South? What is the moral we are talking about? Is it not the South-West that served under Obasanjo for eight years, Osinbajo for another eight years as Vice President? South-South has served its own. Is the South-East not part of the South? That is the question we should answer.”
This drew the ire of all those who do not belong to Afenifere as a group and went all out for the man’s jugular in the most undeserving manner. The disrespectful reactions to Chief Adebanjo’s contention were given impetus by the Director of Media and Publicity of APC Presidential Campaign Council, Mr. Bayo Onanuga. Mr. Onanuga had issued a statement entitled: “Our Reaction to Baba Ayo Adebanjo and his new Ohanifere Venture” in which he described the 94-year-old Afenifere leader as a fake. This is fuelled the verbal attack on the nonagenarian. That momentum created by Onanuga was all that was required to call out the elderly man and call him names. Many people, who were either not born or were too young to understand where Afenifere was coming from, had the courage to talk down on Chief Adebanjo because he expressed an opinion on behalf of a group he is leading. Among many others, they said Afenifere had no relevance and could not make any meaningful impact in the choice of the people at the polls.
Turn the pages forward to the recent visit of the presidential candidate of All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, to the home of a former leader of the same Afenifere, Chief Rueben Fasoranti. 96-year-old Pa Fasoranti had written formally to relinquish his position as the leader of the group and had handed over to Chief Adebanjo. He cited old age as one of the main reasons he could no longer continue in that position he had been holding since 2008. There was no fuss about that smooth transition until after Pa Fasoranti warmly received Tinubu in his home in Akure recently. The fallout of that visit is not just its rancorous reportage, but the unhealthy tinges that were introduced to the event by the mere fact that some people want to get at some people. The after-events of the visit of Tinubu to Akure has left the Yoruba more divided, going by the way the Tinubu camp celebrated the reception by Fasoranti, it is obvious that the statement by Adebanjo hit them below the belt. It could also be taken to mean that Afenifere matters. This is against the impression created by uninformed Tinubu supporters who had ignorantly discredited the group and called it irrelevant. Or could it be that the new bubbly activities brought on a whim about the ‘good Afenifere’ was determined to heighten the attempts to pit Pa Fasoranti against Chief Adebanjo? Now that Chief Fasoranti has reset the entire process as regards leadership, what will now happen to all the bad blood generated?
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For those who have resorted to selling their elders cheap, including Mr. Bayo Onanuga, they should understand that when a child throws his father up into the air, the man’s wrapper will fall on his face. The recent days of the campaigns have shown interesting signs and given vivid signals from those who throw the word: Omoluabi at the people with ease. For those who do not like the fact that leaders of the Yoruba race are being dragged unnecessarily by their younger sons, they should take solace in Albert Einstein’s advice that “if you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not individuals.” For those Nigerians who do not want such pieces of advice, and who have hoisted loyalty to political party as well as loyalty to a political figure higher than straight reasoning, time will tell what happens to the man who is handed the umbrella in a dry evening.
All Nigerians are under the heavy yoke of soaring prices of commodities in the country. The EFCC is pursuing our brothers who make billions in profit from legal and illegal foreign exchange trade. An airline has suspended flights to and from the country for debt reasons. ASUU (again!) and SSANU are spitting fire for half salaries. The Minister of Education and the Minister of Labour, to whom the unions in tertiary institutions intent to run for solution, are also looking for where to run. The Naira is on a free fall, acting like there was a bungee rope to provide a restraint.
APC as a political party and its leaders and members are playing the ostrich (Sir Fred Chukwuelobe says they are ‘living in denial’) while the country spins uncontrollably. Those who should cry out are chasing bats, learning to be articulate or trying to be obedient in the confusing melee.
While we writhe in these, our dear president’s feet are being caressed by dutiful nurses and doctors in England. The man whose house is on fire does not run about chasing rats, I was advised as a little boy.
and then