Category: Gbenga Omotoso

WE all thought it was some mythical construction. Fiction. Some contrivance to stop us from visiting our beautiful countryside. Or the product of the fecundity of some people’s minds. How wrong we were.

From the ever-busy Lagos – Ibadan Expressway – of sweating road builders, whose work seems to be going on for eternity, long fuel trucks parked on both sides of the road in a big community of vices (drug peddlers and their clients, women of doubtful virtues, diesel thieves siphoning their stock from the vehicles) and an army of hawkers pushing their wares of  bread, biscuits, apple and all sorts of edibles at your face. There are also officers stopping vehicles to remind motorists that “your boys dey here o”.

Turn off the road to hit the Ibadan-Ife section and in a few minutes you are confronted with the majesty of nature. Beautiful green forests of tall trees (teak, gmelina, cassia and others), singing birds, grazing cows and the rumbling Asejire dam. Women are hawking bush meat. Some are roasting their stuff, the aroma harassing the nostrils and tempting you to stop for a quick bite. Corn farms and women offering farm-fresh corn on the cob.

You wind down the car’s glasses and soak in the fresh, clean air that the city lacks. There are road-side canteens offering fresh palm wine, pounded yam and, of course, bush meat.

All these are threatened now. The Southwest countryside is being ravaged, not by some strange locusts or rebellious farm hands. No. Some malapert rogues, implacable and deadly criminals have seized this seductive land by the jugular– from Ibadan-Ife to Ilesa and Akure and Akungba. Iwaraja-Efon and Ado-Ijesa-Isu. They are snatching motorists off their vehicles and herding them into bushes, demanding hefty ransom for their freedom.

The stories are touching – torture, rape and death. And payment of hefty ransom in a society where many find feeding a herculean task. Nobody is immune to this madness. The rich are not safe; the poor are in panic. Security agencies seem to be helpless, but I won’t join the thinking in some circles that they are part of this game of death. No. They may not seem to be doing enough, but the conspiracy theory, plausible as it may seem, isn’t that straightforward.

A woman told of how she and her family were tortured for six days. The family lives overseas. Dad, mum and daughter were on holidays. Their heart shattering account , which has been trending on the social media, is titled, “Horror in the kidnappers’ den”. They had travelled from Auchi to Akure.  They planned to stay a few days in Lagos before returning overseas. The journey turned a nightmare on the Akure – Ilesa road. Shortly after the Ijare Junction, they had a flat tyre–apparently contrived to get them stuck.

The driver parked to change the tyre. That was the beginning of six days of horror and bestiality that sounded so incredible, like a scene from a movie. They were hit with guns and blood was all over their bodies. That, in any case, was just a tip of the iceberg of madness the family experienced. The daughter was screaming.

Wrote the woman: “ ‘Mummy, daddy, what’s going on’? There was no time to say a word. They marched us into the bush, firing into the sky. They hit me on my chest. They hit my daughter on her head, blood oozed. At this time, it was better to kill me. I shouted at one of the armed men. His response was hell. He went straight for my private part, tore my dress with his gun. The others ripped my dresses. I was left with my undies. My husband and daughter started crying. Two of them dug their teeth into my breasts.”

One of the gunmen removed the girl’s dresses and carried her on his head as she struggled. The woman said the gunmen were from a certain part of the country; going by their language. How did she know? She said she school in that part of the  country.

After being herded into a forest for nine hours, they were asked to choose who should be raped between mother and her nine-year-old daughter. The father protested that he was a moslem and his religion abhors homosexuals. He was punished for his effrontery in telling them who a true Moslem is. They took turns in raping the poor woman for days.

In the madmen’s den, according to her, were “two women, two ladies and three men”. There were some people whose legs were chained to trees, she said. At the camp were traditional medicine men, a big kitchen and some other things of comfort. “I was not allowed to put on any additional clothing on my body for 24 hours. The rain fell once. I became the relic and a sexual museum for the armed men who in turn addressed me and asked questions about my financial standing. New men joined the camp. They organised military training for the men, teaching them how to shoot and walk through circles of glowing fire,” she said.

The family was released after paying N8million. They are now back overseas, swearing never to visit Nigeria again. She concluded her terrifying story with an admonition for the people to rise against these monsters. She said: “I pity Yoruba people… I worry about the conspiracy of silence by the people themselves, the ignorance, the treachery and the illusion that one day things will get better… .”

A few weeks ago, former students of Christ’s School, Ado – Ekiti were raising money to free one of them who was abducted in Efon-Alaye by some criminals. With him were two boys; twins. Well built and strong, one felt it was not proper to be grabbed like chicken and led away by some tiny ruffians. He challenged them. They slit his hand with a machete.

A bus carrying some church members of a Lagos church was attacked on the Ife-Ilesa expressway by armed men who suddenly jumped onto the road. The driver almost rammed the vehicle into the intruders, who jumped off and opened fire. Luckily, nobody died. That was on June 1.

There is also the audio of a man negotiating ransom with a kidnapper, who spoke smattering pidgin English in a tone that sounds like that of a man struggling to beat a terrible hangover.

Kidnapper: Boy how are dey?

Victim’s relation: I’m fine

Kidnapper: How much dey ground now?

Victim’s relation: Emmm, as in cash, let me explain to you because every member of the family is running up and down. In cash now we have N285, 000 but the person that bought the car (the man on the other end is grumbling). Wait o! Listen to me, the person that wants to buy the car, he wants to buy the car for N385, 000. He said he will bring N200, 000 by 5 o’clock. So, please hold on… . That means if we add this one, it will be 580,000 or so… Now, I am going to the family house. I want to see how much they have gathered there because…every member of the family is donating money. So when I get to the family house now, I will call you.

Kidnapper: Listen to me. You dey hear wetin I tell you now

Victim’s relation: Eehn, go ahead. What did you say?

Kidnapper: I dey tell you; you wan talk now.

Victim’s relation: Okay, go on.

Kidnapper: Even na 50 million you gather now, you no go fit comot this man for my hand.

Victim’s relation: Okay. Well, I will relay your message to the family.

Kidnapper: You hear?

Victim’s relation: Because even me as I am talking to you, I am not well, I am receiving treatment. But let me go to the family, we will call you.

Kidnapper: Why you go call me? I say even na 50 million you gather now, that money, you no go fit comot this man for my hand. You dey hear that?

Victim’s relation: So what do you want us to do now?

Kidnapper: Go find flenty money.

We must do away with the ethnic profiling. Criminals do not operate by tribe. Besides, these gangsters could not have found their evil trade so easy and lucrative without collaboration with some dirty indigenes of their areas of operation.

Who are their collaborators? Who runs their chain of supplies? Where are their guns coming from? Are the security agencies doing enough? Why can’t the states in the Southwest form joint patrol teams to man these roads until these crooks are flushed out?

What are our traditional rulers doing? Who owns the farms from which the hoodlums operate? How do they keep the cash they collect? Are they invincible and invisible? I think we should not leave it all for the government. Every community should organise its own security within the confines of the law. Why not a Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF) to save our countryside that will love to visit quite often?

IF only it could talk like a human being, it would have fought back. Perhaps it could have hired the best lawyers in the land, the SANs, to mount a legal assault to reclaim his much assaulted integrity.

It has no court; neither does it possess the tools of coercion or enforcement like the police. Nor does it carry weapons like soldiers. In fact, it lacks a voice. Helpless. What is more, it is no tangible object, which can be engaged in various ways. No.

Otherwise, considering the abuses to which it has been unjustly subjected, it would have hired protesters – for a few bucks in Abuja, I am told – to hit the street with placards in the manner of Charley Boy’s “Our mumu don do” – whatever happened to the group and its once vociferous patrons.

As I was saying, it would have hired some legal giants to enforce its fundamental human rights to freedom from abuses of whatever kind by whomsoever may want to visit on it such abuses either through its agents, servants, officers, privies and others. It would have surely demanded the enforcement of its right to be left alone in peace, without being lied against as many of our leaders do nowadays.

What? I speak of posterity, the much abused phenomenon on which our politicians hang their fate when they wave farewell to their offices. Why do they think of posterity only when they are about to leave? Why not from the first day in office? Why don’t they think of the place of posterity as they muddle up governance with politics, taking us all on a bumpy ride to, most of the time, nowhere?

Consider Ogun State Governor Ibikunle Amosun, who has said posterity will judge him. He was as unsparing of his political opponents on his last day in office as he was all thorough his mostly turbulent days as governor. Amosun had a colourful pullout – in a military manner – on an open roof ceremonial vehicle. He was beaming and waving excitedly at the crowd of curious residents who came to see him off. Beside him and also waving and smiling occasionally was his lovely wife.

That, in the view of many, would have been just fine. They would have gone home with the bright spectacle, the panache and the razzmatazz of power even  on Amosun’s final outing as governor. But Amosun, being Amosun, would not let such a big occasion pass without firing some darts at his opponents. He did.

He was huffing and puffing, boastful, boisterous and rambunctious.  He put down his predecessors in such a disdainful manner, saying in whatever area Aremo Segun Osoba and Otunba Gbenga Daniel could point at an achievement, he would name 10 of his.

Said His Excellency in Isheri where he inaugurated a project: “They are just envious of our achievements .They are saying I’m the worst governor and I said thank you, people need worst governors like me to redefine the state and the nation. If everybody has been doing this as their bit, Ogun State would not be like this… I know posterity will judge us.”

He was not done. He went on to berate his predecessors and challenged them  to an exhibition of achievements. Besides, he alluded to a likely probe of his administration’s contracts. “Any of our projects that they are able to do it twice the cost we did it, I will salute them because I know what I am saying.”

Echoes of Amosun’s tirade immediately began to reverberate all over the place. Some described it as hate speech, which they said was unbefitting of a leader. Others merely sneered at his subjective assessment of his administration in which he awarded himself high marks. They started raising questions. Samples: How will posterity view the video of Amosun supervising the destruction of the All Progressives Congress (APC) campaign materials at the MKO Abiola Stadium just before President Muhammadu Buhari’s campaign rally that turned awry? How will posterity see Amosun’s defilement of his party’s decision to field Dapo Abiodun for governor, how he divided the APC, weakened it and moved on to fund another  party and its candidate –  all in a morbid bid to install his poodle as governor? Will posterity forget the unprecedented seditious stoning of the President and the Vice-President at the said rally?

However, those are the mild critics of His Excellency. Others went all out, calling him a traitor and a disloyal party man. Suddenly, pictures of Amosun’s trade mark sky-high cap surfaced on the social media with such cheeky captions as, “here lies a monument to impunity, self-conceit and the Samson’s Syndrome”.

I am damn sure the former governor, who is returning to the Senate, will not bother about all that. Why? What else. Posterity, of course.

It was an emotional farewell –some were in tears – in Imo State. After a speech full of nostalgia and spiced with threats against his opponents, His Excellency Owelle Rochas Anayo Okorocha left the  Government House for his private residence in Owerri, the state capital. He would not regale his audience with a list of his achievements, he said, but left it all to – you guessed right – posterity.

His Excellency did not begin his address with the usual signature tune, “my people, my people”. Needless to say, the audience –traditional rulers, aides, security personnel, family members and some ordinary folks – did not have to reply: “Our governor, our governor”, a rallying cry which his opponents had derided as clownish.

He spoke about how insecure the state was when he took over in 2011. Imo, he said, is now secure. No child is out of school for his or her parents’ inability to pay the fees. The urban renewal programme, he said, has changed the face of Owerri. A colleague of mine watching it on television remarked that His Excellency forgot to cite the statues erected in the city for which it has been famous, but which his opponents deride as “Okorocha’s erection”.

These, it is to be noted, are to be recorded by–what else?–poverty.

But, the former governor, never mealy-mouthed, did not forget to address his enemies, who he did not name. He said: “Let me announce to my political enemies, they should stop because they have no justifiable reason to fight me. Rather, if they think they can fight me, let them demonstrate it in the pace of work. But, let me announce again and again. I am a lover of peace, but as I walk out of the Government House, let none fight me and I won’t fight anyone. Governorship is a shield that covers every personality that is in office, but when you remove the shield or the mask off my face, you will see the real Rochas.”

Since Okorocha made that stinging farewell speech, many have been asking: “Who is the real Rochas? A street fighter? Roughneck? Intellectual combatant? Who is he? What can provoke His Excellency to a fight?”

Answers to these questions, I dare say, lie in the belly of – by now you should be damn sure – posterity.

The other day, a colleague was telling me of a young student who said he would like to get in touch with posterity. He asked him why. “I want to plead with him to be merciless with some politicians, who think posterity can be bribed and bought or bloodied and bludgeoned,” he said, adding: “They always run to his court shamelessly after misbehaving; he should punish them.”

Will posterity punish many of our leaders who take its name in vain or garland them? Only posterity, of course, will tell.

A strange school in Lagos

DETECTIVES are holding some suspects for alleged Internet fraud, following the discovery of a strange school somewhere in Ojodu on the outskirts of Lagos.

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) alleges that Frank Chinedu, 22, is the proprietor of a cybercrime training centre, Yahoo Yahoo Training School. He is being held alongside eight young men who are said to be his students.

I hope the EFCC got its facts right before pouncing on Chinedu and his boys. Allegedly seized from them are nine laptops,16  phones, a modem, wifi, and one Toyota Camry.

What is the school’s curricula like? Who owns the property in which it is run? If Chinedu is the proprietor, where are the teachers? How much do the students pay? Were they sent there by their parents or they enrolled on their own? What kind of certificate will they get? How are they tested?

Chinedu and his boys remain suspects until they are proven to be more than that. But the incident has shown our youths’ deadly race for money, the relegation of hard work as a means to wealth and the collapse of parental responsibility.

Our youths indulge in shameless ventures, such as robbery, kidnapping, rituals and, of course, Internet fraud. There is a popular belief among them that a short way to wealth exists and honesty does not pay. Wrong. Treasury looters and their kids who flaunt their ill-gotten wealth all over the place are, by their action, encouraging wayward youths. The EFCC should step up its game to discourage them. Parents must keep telling their children that honesty pays and crime breeds shame.

 

 

EVEN before descending from the podium after making his “godfather can be defeated” statement in Lagos, Nasir El-Rufai had come under attack.

Now, the governor of Kaduna State is being called names, scorned and derided like a drunken motor park tout. To his traducers, His Excellency’s right to free speech means nothing. Hence, he must be pilloried and spanked like a common Lagos pickpocket.

First, a flashback. El-Rufai was in Lagos last weekend to deliver a speech at a forum organised by the Bridge Club, a group of eminent businessmen. Muiz Banire (you remember him; the Lagos lawyer not many would shy away from describing as noteless before being vaulted to commissioner and later legal adviser of the APC?) had remarked that “godfathership” was hindering professionals and businessmen from going into politics. El-Rufai replied with characteristic gusto. He dismissed such fears and went on to tender a proof – he had retired four godfathers in Kaduna, he boasted.

“With about N2bn; if you start, you see, these guys in black ties, they will give you the N2bn. Many of the godfathers are either on paper or in the minds of people in politics. They are defeatable. We retired four of them in Kaduna State within a four-year time and they are gone. One of them boasted that he put me in the government house and he would take me out,” the governor said.

The social media was on fire. Many thought His Excellency was actually attacking Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, the frontline politician and one of the key midwives of the ruling APC on which  platform El-Rufai became governor. Tinubu has been described as the “godfather of Lagos politics”.  Could El-Rufai have been referring to him? Doubtful. Tinubu is not in the league of “chop and quench” godfathers who have grown fat by milking their states dry. The former Lagos governor has bred worthy leaders whose impact is verifiable. They are some of our leading lights.

To many, who claim to be ardent observers of progressive politics and its focus on service delivery, El-Rufai’s comment was at best a blow below the belt and at worst an unnecessary incitement. They pounced on him.

They challenged El-Rufai to name the godfathers he had defeated and asserted that he rode to power on President Muhammadu Buhari’s popularity, not on account of his antecedents either as head of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) where, according to them, public companies were sold to friends and cronies of those in power or as minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) where, according to the critics, he was immersed in nauseating land scandals.

Those, it is to be noted, however, are the charitable critics who spared a thought for objectivity. The unsparing ones tongue lashed El-Rufai like a pupil who soiled his new uniform. They tried to draw a parallel between what they called his petit stature and his proclivity for sudden anger and outbursts. They said (without any scientific proof whatsoever) that short people –among whom I number – are prone to sudden anger and rambunctious tendencies that get them noticed in a crowd. Are these comments fair?

They said Hell (a slip there; I take it back) El-Rufai has always been a godson to benevolent godfathers. Atiku Abubakar, the former vice-president on whose back he rode to government; former President Olusegun Obasanjo who gave him prominent roles and unfettered access in his administration and now President  Buhari before whom he grovels, kneeling down subserviently and disgustingly in public. “It’s all deceit,” they said.

If they had stopped at that, many would not have paid much attention to them, but El-Rufai’s traducers went on to describe him as a traitor who, they claimed, never showed loyalty to anybody or any cause, no matter how noble. Instead, whatever he would not dominate he would either bring to disrepute or destroy.

They, the critics aforementioned, averred that El- Rufai  betrayed Atiku, calling him names after their parting of ways . He, they alleged, betrayed Obasanjo. His Excellency, according to them, betrayed his colleagues in the APC with whom he fought to snatch Kaduna State from the PDP’s firm grip. He is as treacherous as Judas, they alleged.

For proof, the critics referred to Obasanjo’s description of El-Rufai in his trilogy, “My Watch”. Wrote the former President:”Nasir’s penchant for reputation savaging is almost pathological. Why does he do it? He is brilliant and smart. I grant him that also. Very early in my interaction with him, I appreciated his talent and brilliance. At the same time, I recognised his weaknesses, the worst being his inability to be loyal to anybody or any issue consistently for long but only to El-Rufai. He barefacedly lied, which he did to me against his colleagues and so-called friends. I have heard of how he ruthlessly savaged the reputation of his uncle, a man who was like, in the African setting, his foster father. I shuddered when I heard the story of what he did to his half- brother in the Air Force who is senior to him in age.”

He went on to say that “character wise, Nasir has nothing much going for him”, adding that when Osita Chijoka suggested El-Rufai as his (Obasanjo’s) successor, “I did not hesitate to point to Nasir’s naivety and immaturity, talk less of his inability to give honour to whom honour is due.”

Obasanjo, it is to be noted, was reacting to El-Rufai’s claims in his controversial book, “The Accidental Public Servant”. “I read the book and it confirmed my impression of him as a man of first-class brain but arrogant, full of himself, immature and nauseating, trying to make up for his diminutive stature in what is called ‘the small man syndrome’.”

To the curtain-twitching busybodies, El-Rufai’s glowing achievements in Kaduna should be discountenanced. However, to His Excellency’s credit is the peace that has become the lot of the hitherto troubled residents. Gone are the days when gunmen would storm a village in the dead of the night when men and women and children were asleep, shooting indiscriminately, killing residents and setting homes on fire. Now, just scores are killed. How did the governor do it? He inadvertently let out the secret the other day- he paid the herdsmen- gunmen to hold their fire.

Instead of praising his ingenuity, his critics lampooned the idea and said El-Rufai was culpable in the killings. The governor, never a timid man who would be easily intimidated, challenged them to provide proof of their allegation. Nobody did. The matter ended, but the media would not let a sleeping dog lie; they continue to report killings in the state. They say blood continues to flow even as His Excellency remains on the lecture circuit.

Talk of Nero fiddling while Rome was burning.

To El-Rufai’s credit is also the conquest of the political space in a way no governor has ever done. His style is as simple as it is inventive. When he had a disagreement with some politicians, including Senators Shehu Sani and Suleiman Hunkuyi, and all attempts to settle the matter failed, the governor pulled up a joker. When residents were still snoring in bed, he led at dawn a demolition squad to Hunkunyi’s property and rumbled the bulldozer through the edifice. The property was subsequently acquired for public use.

It should be noted, however, that some men, such as Sani, aforementioned, kicked against El-Rufai’s unique formula which, I am told, other governors are signing up to copy. Sani, riled by the governor’s style, railed in the Senate: “El-Rufai is an affliction on Kaduna State. He is a curse to us. We want to call on Buhari to caution his son…We in Kaduna State cannot accommodate somebody who has the tendencies of Adolf Hitler, Mobutu Sese Seko and Nebuchadnezzar.”

Another governor, unsure of what to do with such pesky and pesty comments, would have ordered the senator’s arrest. Not El-Rufai. His Excellency took it all on the chin. Instead of praising his reticence, his critics started talking about El-Rufai’s “huge capacity for mischief, his unbridled ambition, and his tempestuous and abrasive mannerism”.

It has also been asserted that el-Rufai was, by his comments in Lagos, setting the stage for a big fight over the presidency in 2023. Some people, who have remained nameless, are beating the drum to which the governor is dancing, the critics said. That is neither here nor there.  Again, El-Rufai has remained unmoved. Does the governor not deserve some praise for his stoicism?

 

A prince departs

HE was in many ways a prince. His exquisite sartorial taste – he loved white clothes. His love for good food and nice drinks – the common ones and the exotic for special occasions. His love for automobiles – the Mercedes Benz series. His philanthropy – many got education though his generosity. And his passion for the arts.

We will miss all that. Prince Kehinde Adeniyi, fondly called Penny K after the fast food company he set up in the 70s (he was one of the pioneers of the trade in Lagos), an industrialist and music enthusiast, has passed on. His remains will be buried tomorrow in Lagos after a funeral service at the Archbishop Vinning Memorial Church in Ikeja.

It has been floods of tears since his passage on March 30. Amid the tears, many recall his good deeds, his roaring laughter, and his peaceful disposition to all even as he detested cheating in any form.

To many musicians, he was a father. He gave out his equipment, one of the best in the city at a time, for no fees. He once ran a night club, not to make money, but to bring his large circle of friends closer to him.

Prince Adeniyi once threatened to sue Chief Commander Ebenezer Obey for dumping secular music without, according to him, considering his numerous fans. Such was his jocular nature. When his mother died, King Sunny Ade was on the bandstand right in his commodious backyard–free of charge. He was a giant in the Lagos social circle.

He raised capital for many small business owners. They called him Baba (father) not on account of his age –he was 72 – but for his generosity.He was a good man.

This is the consolation for his relations, associates and friends. Farewell, egbon.

SINCE the elections ended somehow, they have played prominent roles in our leaders’ discourse. Not that they are new or strange. No. The new thing about them is that they have been brought out and pressed to service in a creative manner that has no doubt drawn the attention of many who love elegance and precision.

They have been deployed in seminar halls, meetings, church services and at victory parties. Even at the tribunals, where many have taken their grievances, they have come in handy as conveyors of the thoughts of litigants.

In case you have started wondering what “Editorial Notebook” is up to this morning with that rather long and loose introduction, let me quickly reassure you that it is no voyage to an empty island, dear reader. Neither is it an attempt to bore you with unnecessary details and waste your precious time. No.

It is all an attempt to put on record the uses to which our politicians have put some words and phrases since the general election moved from the polling stations to the tribunals. I wonder how we could have understood the mood and thoughts and actions as well as inactions of our leaders without these grammatical elements.

So bloody were the elections in Rivers State that the military set up a panel of inquiry to probe the role of its men in what Governor Nyesom Wike described as a “shameful conduct”. He claimed that soldiers invaded the collation centre, fired shots, battered the INEC officials and snatched away the result sheets. At a point when  His Excellency recalled the gory events of the elections, he broke down in tears and reminded his audience that he had warned stridently that his victory was not worth anybody’s blood, yet so much blood was spilled. Poor fellow.

The opposition  African Action Congress (AAC) disagreed. It claimed that Wike was the aggressor who stormed the collation centre with thugs and an army of policemen. They grabbed the result sheets and left after attacking some soldiers who had urged them to be peaceful, the opposition said. There were photographs of some soldiers lying on hospital beds, their heads smashed.

It is not yet clear if the probe unravelled what went wrong, but Wike, apparently not one to bear any grudge against anyone, has put all that behind him. He has been promising an “inclusive” government. His opponents have been asking: “What is an “inclusive” government?” “Which one be dat? Perhaps His Excellency got a security report that the phrase was too complex for his audience, he changed it and vowed to run “an all-inclusive” government.

“All-inclusive”; what is that? his friends and foes are asking: ‘Does an ‘all-inclusive’ government mean that the opposition will get some executive council seats? Will leaders of the opposition be asked to nominate candidates for some “juicy” positions? Does it mean that all sections of the society will be represented in the government? Why can’t the government be “exclusive”? The questions have been coming from friends and foes.

Before observers could grab the essence of His Excellency’s thoughts, another phrase had hit the scene, with the media reporting that Wike was “waving the olive branch”. He delivered a statesman’s speech in which he urged the leading lights of the opposition to join him in developing the state.

What kind of “olive branch” is that, a leading opposition figure was quoted as saying. How about those who lost their loved ones for no reason? Is he extending the “olive branch” also to them? “Do we believe in the same ideology?”

Kwara State Governor-in- waiting Adulrahman AdulRasaq has also promised an “all inclusive government”. Not many understand him, I am told. Residents have been asking: “Is an all-inclusive government one that will absorb members of the opposition PDP who were swept off the scene by’ Cyclone O to gee’? Does it mean a bit of the old order mixed with the new and everything in-between? What exactly is “an all-inclusive government”? A new wine in an old wineskin?

Kwarans may have to wait till May 29 and beyond to find answers to these nagging questions, but an aide of the governor-elect has told me that” good times are on the way”. He says that all the vestiges of the situation that sparked and fuelled the “O to gee” (enough is enough) phenomenon will be cleared off for a new day in which all Kwarans will have a sense of belonging.

In Lagos State, the PDP is in turmoil. Party leaders are asking governorship candidate Jimi Agbaje to explain how he spent the cash he got during the campaign. They are angry that Agbaje “did not carry them along”.  When are party leaders expected to be “carried along”? How; driving them to campaign grounds? Informing them about how the party’s programmes should be sold to the electorate? Sitting with them at those all-night meetings?

It’s really not clear. What is clear is that PDP chiefs had been at war even before the party suffered a crushing defeat in the election. Party chair Adegbola Dominic has accused Agbaje of ruining the party’s chances by “running a solo campaign” and not “carrying party leaders along”. He recalls how presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar sent some money to the party for its campaign and how Agbaje got the cash and shared it as he liked without “carrying along” the party’s leaders. They were not privy to how the cash was shared, the sharing formula;  who got what and what for.

Agbaje has fired back, saying he has been under attack because he refused to leave the party’s structure in the hands of “self-centred” chieftains. Besides, he is threatening a legal battle of integrity against those maligning his reputation.

From all indications, the party chiefs would not have grumbled that they were not “carried along” if Mr Agbaje had surrendered the cash. How much did he get?  Were the funds audited? Who did he “carry along” in this matter?

Will the elders forgive Agbaje if he promises to “carry them along” next time? What does the PDP constitution say about candidates who fail to “carry along” the elders? What will make a candidate not to “carry along” these VIPs? Greed? Ignorance? Arrogance?

As Agbaje heads for the court to reaffirm his integrity,  others are at the tribunals in desperate battles to retrieve his “stolen mandates”.  Many are searching for their “stolen mandates” in Sokoto, Benue, Kano, Oyo, Kaduna and others.

If a mandate is such an important possession, a friend has asked me, why allow a thief to steal it? If it is such a precious belonging, why won’t our politicians be wise enough to insure it so that when it is stolen, the insurer will be the one to undergo the often rigorous search for it? Why do they prefer lawyers to go in search of their “stolen mandates”? Why don’t they provide enough security for their mandates? Most Nigerians are scared of kidnappers and bandits; politicians are afraid of mandate thieves. Why?

I really don’t know, but going by the huge number of politicians looking for their stolen mandates, will it be out of place to suggest that the police should create a Special Protection Unit (SPU) for the protection of mandates and their owners?

 

Lucky girl Zainab Aliyu

NOT many have been as lucky as Zainab Aliyu, a student held in Saudi Arabia for alleged  drug trafficking. She knew nothing about the substance planted in her luggage by wicked officials at the Kano Airport. Drug trafficking is a capital offence in the Saudi Kingdom.

After a thorough investigation had shown that Zainab and Ibrahim Abubakar were innocent, the Federal Government stepped in to secure their release. They escaped death by the skin of their teeth.

It has been kudos all the way for the government. But many are imputing ethnic and religious sentiments into the swift action that got the duo off the hook. They are asking why such an action has not been taken concerning Leah Sharibu, the Boko Haram captive. They are right to be so concerned about the poor girl who is suffering because she failed to renounce Christianity. The government should do everything possible to secure her freedom. Others being held by the group, which has tested the might of our military, should also be freed by whatever means.

The situations are, unfortunately, quite different even if the circumstances are similar. Boko Haram is an organisation of anarchists whose mode of operation defies reason. It is pure savagery. The group’s leaders are impervious to logic and the clarity of thought that governs human engagements. Saudi Arabia is a sovereign country governed by rules; a sane society.

The government should do more to unmask other members of the evil gang that plants drugs in people’s luggage. Some of them have been arrested; others should be fished out and made to face the law. No fewer than 23 Nigerians are on the death row in Saudi Arabia. Some of them may be victims of these airport officials’ cruelty. It will be nice if the Presidency can make a case for a review of their cases.

Where is the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) in all this? Why do our airports lack CCTV facilities that can ensure that criminality does not flourish? How do we recruit airport officials?  Kudos to Hon Abike Dabiri – Erewa, the Senior Special Assistant  to the President on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, who has been leading the battle against this evil.  Her work is not done, until the nonsense  stops and the perpetrators are punished.

A COLOURFUL procession of excited youths, who were singing, drumming and dancing. There was no sign that something unusual could happen. It was a sunny, bright and beautiful day. Most of the youths belonged to the Boys’ Brigade. Those who couldn’t join the parade were waving at them. Elders were smiling in appreciation of the yearly show that marks the end of Easter – the triumph of our Lord Jesus Christ over death.

Then came the chilling moment. A driver rammed into the procession and mowed down a long line of active boys who had dreamt of a great future. No fewer than eight died. All was silent for a while. When those left standing somehow recovered from the shock of what had happened, they sped after the driver, caught up with him and lynched him. His passenger was not spared. An eye for an eye.

What happened in Gombe on Easter Monday? Why did an agent of death visit those youths celebrating the triumph of the Saviour over death? Was it spiritual or ordinary? Was the evil driver struck by a strange mental illness? If so, what about the other occupier of the vehicle; could he have been mentally deranged too? An error? No. The driver had passed the procession before reversing his vehicle and plunging into the row of youths.

It is neither here nor there.

A newspaper headline captured it all. “Bloody Easter,” it roared like a typical tabloid, always screaming for attention. That was not just screaming as an expression of character; it was truly bloody.

In Sri Lanka, no fewer than 359 people died on Sunday when bombs ripped through some churches and hotels. Many were hospitalised. Eight blasts were reported during Easter services. A family was at breakfast, taking photographs and laughing heartily just before the blast. They died. The explosions seemed to have been well coordinated, occurring  simultaneously in as many as eight places.

President Muhammadu Buhari sent his condolences. Pope Francis, in his traditional “ Urbi et Urbi” speech, condemned the attacks as “such cruel violence”, which had targeted Christians celebrating Easter.  Seven suspects were said to have been arrested. But the question remains – why the violence, particularly in Christendom’s season of renewal, regeneration and freshness? Who did it?

There were other incidents here and there. Gunmen attacked a village in Katsina, killing 10 residents. The military has been battling bandits in Katsina, Sokoto, Zamfara and Kaduna. They seem to be in a hurry to impose a reign of savagery on us all. The more the government moves to rein them in, the more vicious they get.

Police officers went after a suspected car thief in Ogoja, Cross River State. Instead of giving up the stolen car, the suspect unleashed his thugs on the officers who were attacked with machetes. They were said to have restrained from firing at their assailants so as not to be accused of extrajudicial killing. Were their lives not endangered?

Poor officers, they were on a legitimate voyage in search of the truth – who is behind the car thieves? Why the brigandage?  But the truth has always been the victim. Many of our leaders live in a world of fakery where truth is stifled and all that matters is self interest.

When Pontius Pilate asked what the truth was concerning the allegations against Christ, the priests lied. They were desperate to nail him – to nail the truth. He asked who to release between Barabbas the thief and Jesus; the crowd roared that Barabbas should be freed. “What then should I do to Christ?” Pilate asked. “Crucify him,” they chorused. Pilate then washed his hands with water, saying: “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see you to it.” His wife had actually sent him a message, warning that he should not join the grand conspiracy against Jesus Christ (women could be more cautious in deciding delicate matters).

He recused himself from the case. How many judges of today will quit a case for genuine reasons that run against the thought of the powers that be? But then, couldn’t Pilate have sat over the matter and set Christ free as he had committed no offence? The scriptures cannot be broken.

Truth is so hard to defend today in our polity where crowds are glorifying corruption suspects. A suspect is believed to be in trouble only because he is of the opposition party. Any attempt to talk about the past looting of the treasury is condemned as lack of vision or just laziness. As far as many are concerned, no need to look into the past; only the present matters.

A friend was saying on Good Friday that “by this time some 2000 years ago, Judas Iscariot had received alert”. Isn’t treachery the hallmark of our politics? Leaders squeal on one another in a desperate bid to acquire power, in most cases, as an end in itself and not a means to an end, which should be a better life for all.

After realising his folly, Judas returned the money he had collected for betraying Christ. When the priests refused to take it from him, he dumped it and left. How many of our former looters –sorry; an error there – leaders will voluntarily surrender their loot. They seek plea bargaining only when they can see that the prison gate is wide open to let them in.

The police in Ondo State are searching for a man who sold his mother – yes; his mother – for N7m to ritualists. When the money ritual failed, as the story goes, the evil men went after the man to demand refund of the cash. They claimed that the 60-year-old woman’s hunchback was not original. He fled. Will he out of his own volition return the cash as Judas did? Why will a man surrender his own mother to killers for money? Foolishness? Wickedness? Criminality? Tough to decipher.

There is also the question of restitution, repentance and forgiveness. Was Judas genuinely repentant when he threw the money back at the priests? Could he have done that if it was more than he got? Did he make restitution? How many of our leaders actually apologise when they err? Do they regret any of their actions? Was it just the love of money that made Judas to do it or it was all in fulfilment of the scriptures, “which cannot be broken”?

One point remains indisputable – death will never have the final say. Architects of violence will never. Anarchists will never. The government should ensure that they don’t. That is the lesson of Easter, which they and their agents are and which many of us have forgotten, drowned in the revelry of the holidays.

An ex-president’s bloody end

Just before Good Friday, a former president of Peru died after shooting himself in the head as police entered his home to arrest him on corruption charges. Alan Garcia was 69. He was president twice – from 1985 to 1990 and 2006 to 2011. The police stormed his home, armed with a warrant – and, of course, guns – to detain him in connection with a bribery probe.

Can we have a Garcia here? Oh yes; we have them, but I doubt if we can have one who will think it is better to just end it all – somehow. Our leaders love life. They love power; they love money; they love all the good things that money can get and all the excesses that power guarantees. To them, being accused of bribery is no big deal. They will hire a battalion of senior lawyers to defend them in court. They will look the judge in the face and tell him that he has no jurisdiction to try them. The judge may insist he has. Instead of facing the law with a bold face if they are sure of their integrity, they will seek to prolong the matter. They will fight up to the highest court in the land, their supporters hailing and cheering them as if they and their children are not the ultimate targets of their indulgence.

If they are unlucky, they may be convicted after about eight years of a legal rigmarole and gymnastics. If they choose not to undergo the rigours of coming in and out of the court, they will simply file for plea bargaining, surrender a fraction of their loot and go home in peace.

Peru seems to have no such cosy room for corrupt leaders. So, Garcia decided not to bend it but to end it in such a brutal manner. He fell on his own sword. Again, can we have a Garcia here? No, I dare say. Our leaders enjoy the fruits of corruption and , irony of ironies, preach to us the rudiments of good conduct. Shame.