Sanwo-Olu: Fragile, handle with care!

IF you interview 10 people in Lagos, five or six will tell you they think the All Progressives Congress governorship candidate in next year’s election, Mr. Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu, will most likely win. Ask them again what they knew about Sanwo-Olu as a person or his pedigree, many of them are likely to draw blank. Same if you seek to know the policies and programmes being enunciated by the APC candidate. The reasons for this are not far to fetch: Politics and elections here are not as much about the candidate as they are about the party Leader and the platform. If the party Leader and or platform is popular and acceptable, the deed is virtually done. Recently, however, there is the clamour that the electorate should discard this age-old practise and x-ray candidates rather than accept any Tom, Dick and Harry put forward by the party or hero-worship the Leader. In the First Republic, at least in the then Western Region or South-west, our fathers knew only Awolowo and his party and whosoever was put forward by the Leader was the choice of the electorate. This has largely remained so up to this day. The party or platform holds sway; even the 1999 Constitution (as amended) and the courts uphold this. Another reason why Sanwo-Olu is relatively unknown is because of the way he emerged. But for the fact that the Lagos APC godfathers stoutly rejected the second term bid of Gov. Akinwunmi Ambode, there would have been no Sanwo-Olu, at least for now. So, Sanwo-Olu is a child of circumstance, as it were. He could not have prepared for the “agbami” or middle of the deep, blue sea that he suddenly found himself. He could, however, not have been luckier for two reasons. One: he has a formidable political structure behind him. His is a case of someone standing on the shoulders of giants. Initially, it looked as if Akinwunmi would put up a good fight but he soon crumbled like a pack of cards as he was easily out-foxed by the old, tested, and experienced wily foxes he was up against. The moment the Lagos and Abuja factions of Lagos APC found a meeting point and decided to share the spoils, with the Lagos faction getting the governorship (Sanwo-Olu) and the Abuja end getting the deputy governor (Hamzat Babafemi), Ambode’s political fate was sealed, at least for now. Two is the shortage of heavy-weight political gladiators in the state. Except for the Peoples Democratic Party’s governorship candidate, Jimi Agbaje, the field is left wide open for Sanwo-Olu. Of the two, Agbaje is better known, having been in the field, criss-crossing one party to another in search of the elusive crown but it is doubtful if, even now, he has enough backbone as Sanwo-Olu. Politics and elections are, interestingly, both predictable and unpredictable at same time, especially so in these climes. Unpredictable because voter behaviour can experience wide swings at short notice; elections, however, began to wear a cloak of certainty since APC as the ruling party at the Centre began to throw everything it controls and commands into the fray. So, from Edo to Ondo to Ekiti to Osun and other parts of the country, INEC and the security forces have helped the party out-muscle and outmanoeuvre its opponents. So, head or tail, Sanwo-Olu looks good to go – except there is an upset.

But I digress! My reason for actually writing this piece is that every day as I drive around Lagos and encounter Sanwo-Olu’s campaign posters, I am amused by the kind of personality he projects. Photographs are like standing before the mirror. What you see is what you are! Photographs, they say, don’t lie. You may not have given it serious thought but try and do so from now on. The photographs of Sanwo-Olu project a personality that is fragile and breakable. If you were to package him in a container, you will most likely label it “Fragile: Handle with care” I am sure you know those kind of “Breakable: Handle with care” materials. Compare him with Ambode, for instance: Stout, burly, sturdy. But Sanwo-Olu in his photographs (I have not met him in person or spoken with him) looks reserved, even reticent, self-effacing, gentle, and not ponderous. He appears in his photographs as that kind of personality grandma taught me are too quiet and too reserved that they are not able to say all they have to say. But, oh my, they can be made of steel inside! It reminds me also of an incident in my secondary school days at Owo High School, Owo. Terror-inspiring Mr. Omole (formerly Mr. Jacobs) had brought out the Head Girl and flogged her mercilessly. Omole had this saying: If you want to flog a person, you must flog him and let him know that someone flogged him. That was how he flogged the Head Girl. The next day, the Head Girl’s father, a senior tutor at the nearby St. John/Mary’s Teacher Training College (which was like a University in those days), came to the school to inquire what could have warranted such bestial treatment. Tears in his eyes, he said: “Toyin, my daughter, is such a well-behaved girl that even if you put sugar in her mouth, it will not melt” Sanwo-Olu appears to me like Toyin but I am sure you know what we are going to put in his mouth if he wins the election is not sugar but power, influence, and money, all of which taste sweeter than sugar. What he will do with them, we may not be able to say a priori. We have to wait until he gets into office – if Jimi Agbaje or a dark horse does not upstage him. But should he get into office and his looks belie his actions, then, I will tell you the name my people call such a person!

• Shittu: Putting the cart before the horse

Buhari clears the air on Jubril  

At long last, President Muhammadu Buhari has cleared the air on the widely- and wildly-circulated rumour about his alleged death and cloning. I once purchased a book in my University days, which someone loaned but never returned; it is titled “In his image: The cloning of a man”. It depicted how a man decided to clone himself. So when the rumour of Buhari’s cloning broke, I knew it was at least a scientific or fictional possibility. For decades, scientists have grappled with how to clone or make human beings and have attained a bewildering level of success along the line. Experience shows that the first step on the road to invention is the ability to imagine or think about it. If you can think it, then, you can do it. The secrecy surrounding Buhari’s health has not helped matters. The nature of his sickness is yet to be officially disclosed. The cabal that surround him have not helped matters. As we speak, the little that is known about Buhari’s health and treatment – plus the cost at public expense – is courtesy of the rumour mill. A nation that suffered similarly in respect of the late President Umaru Yar’Adua cannot be blamed if it believes any rumour, especially when facts are not forthcoming. Now that he has started to open up, Buhari must go the whole hog by disclosing his health status and the cost to taxpayers. He must also stop this colonial mentality of deferring to foreign journalists while spurning Nigerian journalists at home. Charity, they say, begins at home.

LAST WORD: The Army authorities must come out clean on the actual number of soldiers lost to Boko Haram at Metele, including those “missing in action” – as well as their names and where they come from. The rumour doing the rounds about the ethnicity of the casualties is damaging; damn too damaging. Clear the fouled air, please!
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RE: Adebayo Shittu

I shuddered to read “What is Adebayo Shittu still doing in government (18th November) and “Adebayo Shittu: NYSC, threats or blackmail? (25th November) together with the write-up on the gruesome murder of Jamal Kashoggi, the Saudi journalist – but we have had similar occurrences here. Dele Giwa, celebrated Nigerian journalist, was killed through parcel bomb in a way that was as professionally done as Kashoggi’s. Please beware of your movements because those threats may not be empty. We often pray for you. God in His infinite mercies and compassion will protect you from predators.

—Prince Bola Olaoye, Osogbo.

It is only in Nigeria that shameless public officials lacking decency and courage would adamantly refuse to quit whenever their hands are caught in the cookie jar or they openly disobey the law. Kindly remain resolute! No shaking, as they say in our local parlance. Call the bluff of Adebayo Shittu and let him go through with his threat. The two of you will have your day in court. And before then, you shall remain protected by the Lord you worship daily! No evil shall befall you!  Shittu is being disingenuous buying time to remain in the cabinet of President Buhari using delay tactics. It was reported he had sued the NYSC for not sending him a call-up letter to enlist for national service. Knowing the way the wheel of justice grinds so slowly in Nigeria, the case may not come up for hearing until the life of the administration terminates in 2019. He would then claim that he was not booted out of office or forced to resign. The dummy being sold to the President by the minister on why he is sitting tight in office is that the matter is in court and it would be prejudicial to take any action, which I consider as hogwash. He should honourably resign and wait for the verdict on his suit before the court.  The arrogance for failing to do so is arrant nonsense and a blemish on Buhari’s administration, which prides itself as a proponent of the rule of law.  If Kemi Adeosun was forced to resign, Adebayo Shittu must be given the same treatment. If not, it has no other name but “double standard.” Keep up the good work of exposing public officials’ malfeasance!

—Yacoob Abiodun