Category: Jide Oluwajuyitan

Doyin Okupe is an illustrious scion of illustrious pa Mathew Okupe of ‘Agbonmagbe’ bank fame. The father was one of the wealthiest Nigerians of his time. Young and gifted Doyin must have resolved at an early age not to fall below his illustrious father’s social ladder. Perhaps for this reason, although  a trained medical doctor, he thrives more as a politician  and contractor, the two most rewarding callings  in our nation, where any upstart without Okupes talents and the privilege of being born with a silver spoon effortlessly finds himself at the top of the social ladder.  Goodluck Jonathan, an unknown shoeless school boy turned President, finds men of influence like Okupe irresistible. Even when the President was forewarned while appointing him to launder the image of his government, that Okupe, by his caustic tongue and temperament would create more enemies for the President, he did not give a damn. All that mattered was having a man of influence like Okupe on his side to intimidate his political adversaries. But tragically, Okupe has turned out to define all that is wrong with Jonathan’s presidency.

Of course, President Jonathan has reaped handsomely from his investment on Okupe. Unfortunately for us as a nation, the President’s gain is Nigeria’s loss. As predicted, Okupe has with his caustic tongue alienated some of those whose name Jonathan once swore by. For instance, the President once rated Obasanjo as the greatest influence in his life after God and his parents. Few weeks back, Okupe wrote Obasanjo off as being incapable of winning any election for PDP in the South-west. He traded him off for Buruji Kashamu, the President’s new friend and Obasanjo’s foe. Not too long ago, he also questioned Pastor Tunde Bakare’s credentials for criticizing government economic policies. At the  time Okupe was serving a different master, it was Bakare who mobilized his group  to secure for the President, his  constitutional right, then abridged by ailing Yar’ Adua’s  kitchen cabinet headed by now jailed James Ibori.

Just as he had turned old friends to sworn foes at home, he has by his haughtiness and offensive habit of denying what would be obvious even to the half blind, forced exasperated traditional friends of Nigeria in the international community to give up on the search for the abducted Chibok 200 girls ‘wishing Goodluck’s Nigeria, good luck’. Others have publicly challenged the President over his handling of corruption among his party men. Even African leaders like Yoweri Museveni of  Uganda, tongue in cheek says to his people that certain things cannot happen in his country because Ugadan is not  Nigeria while South  Africa that has, according to Mandela always looked up to Nigeria as hope of Africa, recently gave President Jonathan a stern warning that the type of impunity that thrives in Nigeria has no place in South Africa when it confiscated $15 million illegally ferried to the country in a private jet with government backing.

Last week, Okupe totally went out of control directing his diatribe at those who have in the wake of worsening insecurity problems reminded the President that a government that cannot secure life and property of the people loses the raison d’être of government and thus loses its legitimacy. Puffing and huffing, Okupe whimsically dismissed ‘Bola Tinubu andhis colleagues in the opposition as a bunch of political anarchists and charlatans blinded by an unbridled appetite for power’. Where what was expected of an image maker was to reassure the public of what government was doing, his puerile message to embarrassed Nigerians and besieged people of parts of Nigeria now under the control of cave men was to remind us ‘it was leading members Tinubu’s party who vehemently opposed and openly criticised the proscription of the Boko Haram sect by the federal government in 2013.’ With such, mischief and insensitivity, Nigerians can see why Boko Haram appears unstoppable.

Governor Babatunde Fashola, also had a taste of Okupe’s caustic tongue. Fashola had at the 50th birthday celebration of former Governor Timipre Sylva said Jonathan’s government “had been inactive for three years and in the fourth year intends to give the electorate kerosene, price and money for the purpose of seeking their votes.” Okupe’s specious response was, ‘I want to say that we have no apologies for stating the obvious fact that this administration has surpassed all the others before it.’ Okupe forgets it is only the citizens who can say that. But he did not stop at that. He went on to query Governor Fashola  for ‘coming to Abuja to give a satirical lecture pretending to be a catholic priest after ‘leaving the putrid stench of alleged financial immorality and impropriety in Lagos where under his watch it is rumored that private individuals have acquired more wealth than the state government’. And now because of what Okupe described as rumor, Fashola has lost his right to call attention to the federal government mishandling of our economy and the war against insurgency that threaten the survival of the nation.

Besides Tinubu and Fashola, there were others at the receiving end of Okupe’s diatribe last week. The Deputy Governor of Borno state, Zanna Mustapha’s observation that ‘it is a big crime that the criminals are better equipped than the military’ and that going by the ease with which Boko Haram was capturing territories in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe, (over 20 LGA as at the last count), “If the Federal Government does not add extra effort, in the next two to three months, the three North-eastern states will no longer be in existence.”  That, in addition to Atiku’s own warning that ‘if the activities of the insurgents were not quickly curtailed, they could overrun the entire region,’ attracted only the usual Okupes’s tirade. His bizarre response was ‘to recommend critics of Jonathan’s handling of Boko Haram insurgency for a psychiatric test’. And as a merchant of mischief, he added ‘it was wrong for someone aspiring to lead the country to speak ill of the armed forces because he would command the same military if elected’. As an image maker who pretends not to know the buck stops on his principal’s table, he alleged  ‘it was the people like Atiku Abubakar who said that those who make peaceful change impossible make violent change inevitable’, before the 2011 election that encouraged Boko Haram to take up arms against their state’. Such crooked logic only confirms the fears of those who insist Jonathan’s government is clueless. And if Nigerians wanted an answer as to why Boko Haram outwitted Nigeria authorities, capturing the chief of defence staff’s town and torching his personal house while he was busy selling a non-existent cease fire agreement to Nigerians and assuring parents to expect the release of their loved ones abducted over six months ago, it was precisely because we have men who trade in mischief thinking for government.

Okupe probably persuaded the President that Shettima who had in February said “Boko Haram are better armed and are better motivated than our own troops. Given the present state of affairs, it is absolutely impossible for us to defeat Boko Haram,” was out to undermine the efforts of the military and subvert Jonathan’s presidency. The president soon followed what was nothing but blackmail, to threaten Shettima that if he withdrew the soldiers from Borno, Shettima would not be able to hold on to his coveted office of governor for long.  Today, nine months after Shettima’s alarm and the president’s un-presidential response to a patriotic call to avert a looming tragedy, the chicken has finally come home to roost. Nigeria has now been said to have the highest number of terrorist killings in the world with over 4000 lives lost in the past year. While government was scrambling for $1 billion foreign loan to buy arms, Boko Haram has moved out of Sambisa forest capturing an area said to be larger than Ekiti and Ondo states.

And finally, the damning verdict Okupe had tried to keep away from Nigerians is now in the open. A former British military attaché recently confirmed what concerned Nigerian had always feared- that the Nigeria military is “a shadow of what it’s reputed to have once been. It’s fallen apart.” They are short of basic equipment, including radios and armoured vehicles. Morale is said to be low. The country’s defense budget accounts for more than a third of the security budget of $5.8 billion, but only 10% is allocated to capital spending’ .

Politics either as a pursuit of power to establish order and justice, or to resolve conflicts over cultural differences and the sharing of scarce resources in society, is a noble calling. Unfortunately because of the distasteful activities of some members of Nigeria governing elite since the outset of the fourth republic, many have come to regard politics as an ignoble vocation where principles and honour are routinely traded for political expediency and where the end justifies the means. The events in the last one week tend to give ammunition to those who erroneously view all politicians as scoundrels who wallow in corruption and other forms of immoral behaviour. For instance, after two years of playing the ostrich, President Jonathan has finally admitted that he was going to contest. Similarly, a serial ‘cross-carpeter’, Olusegun Mimiko of Ondo whose re-election Obasanjo had alleged, was supported by President Jonathan at the expense of his party’s candidate as a trade-off for future support for his ambition, exhibited an art he has perfected – trading for positions Then Peter Obi, erstwhile APGA governor of Anambra who boasted of having installed another APGA governor, an installation many Nigerians know was aided by the president, decamped to work for the president’s re-election.

Most Nigerians were not taken by surprise when newspapers’ reports late last week claimed that “President Jonathan has moved to formalise his re-election process with the constitution of a declaration committee” in order to beat an ultimatum from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the party that had already adopted and endorsed him as its sole candidate. The endorsement followed a circus show around the country during which about eight million signatures (half of which came from South-south and South-east) of Nigerians who earnestly yearned for Jonathan’s re-election, were claimed to have been secured. That also was preceded by TAN’s deployment of billions of naira for subliminal media campaigns for the battle for our minds and to tell the public-about the president’s imaginary giant strides in the departments of power generation, rehabilitation of roads and rail lines and his war against Boko Haram which we were told he had fought to a standstill, even with over 200 girls abducted from their schools six months ago still marooned in Sambisa caves.

This was followed by further assault on our sensibilities. Mimiko who was a health commissioner in the Alliance for Democracy government of Adebayo Adefarati before defecting to PDP to serve as secretary to government of Olusegun Agagu from where he defected to Labour to become a governor, has like a trader haggling for the best bargain once again decamped. This was after swearing many times he would not join the PDP, publicly proclaiming “We are irrevocably committed to the true ideal of progressive politics which the (Labour) party truly represents”, and in fact went further to tell newsmen after the Labour National Executive Committee, NEC, meeting, in Abuja on Wednesday, September 10, that his reported plan to defect to the PDP, was a rumour. The same politician on October 2, twenty-two days after this solemn declaration, turned up in the presidential Villa, Abuja to make a formal declaration of defection to PDP at an event presided over by Vice President Namadi Sambo.

And finally, Peter Obi whose spirit was with PDP while publicly adorning the cloak of APGA to fulfil all righteousness while Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu was alive dumped the party. Without any feeling of remorse, he went on to remind the PDP team that came to induct him that “I have in the past worked closely with all of you and you know my belief about our zone working together. I assure you that we will continue to work even closer as a team in the interest of our people.” Hise followed up that confession of having led a double life, by telling Bianca Ojukwu, the wife of his benefactor that he was defecting to PDP, “a place where his contributions towards proper representation of the Igbo will have the level of impact that will make Ikemba rejoice in his grave”.

But when Obasanjo, the oracle of Owu who is today probably laughing us to scorn foretold the tales of these politicians who have defined politics in their own image, we left the message and attacked the messenger. Many Nigerians have probably forgotten that Obasanjo told Jonathan that it would be immoral for him to seek re-election in 2015. He had anchored his argument on PDP constitution as well as the understanding the president reached with northern governors. According to Obasanjo, Governor Suswam first told him that President Jonathan “had accepted a one-term presidency to allow for ease of getting support across the board in the North”. Obasanjo also claimed Jonathan confirmed to him that as ‘a strong believer in a one-term of six years Presidency’, the unexpired time of his predecessor and the four years of his first term, would have almost made up six years and would not need any more term or time’. On the account of this, Obasanjo had justified his stand in his famous letter to his godson on the importance of ‘trust and honour as important ingredients of character’.

We must not allow the noisy sound beats from the drums of those engaged in the business of drafting the president to stifle the quest by a few for the president’s explanation He is at liberty to renege on previous agreement if indeed there was any in the face of new realities. But in an election season, he owes those cynical Nigerians who have always insisted Nigerian politicians have no souls some explanation if only to show he is different.

And now that the President will need the support of all Nigerians beyond his Ijaw nation, I also think in the same spirit, he will need to disabuse the minds of all Nigerians by debunking Obasanjo’s claims that he has been  exploiting ‘sentiments and emotions of religion and ethnicity’ which he said ‘ was self-serving, unpatriotic and mischievous,’ and would amount to  ‘preying on dangerous emotive issues that can ignite uncontrollable passion and destabilise if not destroy our country”.  Today except during the crisis leading to the civil war, Nigeria has never been more divided along the lines of religion and ethnicity. President Jonathan and his party have curiously given the impression that PDP, made up of dealers and wheelers who would not even consider an aircraft owned by CAN president too sacred to, as government detractor’s claim, launder, US$15 million to South Africa while labeling the opposition APC as the party for Muslims and the sponsors of Boko Haram. It is most unlikely the president can win a re-election contest with only the votes of his Christian supporters; it is also not likely he can achieve the same objective with South-south and South-east votes where economic parasites and militant warlords-turned government contractors have been acting as if they alone can secure victory for the president.

Beyond this, the president, also needs to be reminded as 2015 approaches, that surrounding himself with leaders without character will be counter-productive. I think it is a myth to assume that in a free and fair election, such men can mobilise votes in places where people have always been known to exhibit independent voting behaviour. The outcomes of the last election in both Ondo and Anambra, whose governor and ex-governor have been falling over each other to secure a place in the presidential election committee have been adjudged heavily flawed even by INEC. A repeat of what happened in the two states or deployment of thousands of military, police and other security personnel to intimidate and arrest opposition leaders on the eve of election as was done in Ekiti and Osun will only undermine the legitimacy of the outcome of the exercise.

It is not only Wole Soyinka, our own Nobel laureate and a citizen of the world that has found Kayode Fayemi’s defeat and Ayo Fayose’s political resurrection in Ekiti after eight years in the wilderness inexplicable. Ekiti intellectuals, including a professor of nuclear chemistry from the University of Ife who after listening to Fayose’s inaugural speech was shouting hysterically, “Can you now see what your people have done”, swearing to take a sabbatical from home for the next four years, are still dazed. But I reassured my friend that with okada riders and motor park touts now given rooms in Government House by Fayose who has said industrialization is not his priority and has gone ahead to appoint Sunday Anifowose as Personal Assistant on Special Duties and Stomach Infrastructure, a professor of nuclear chemistry would not be missed.

Fayose’s unexpected victory no doubt defied logic. Here was a man whose first term was marked by violence which found expression in the unresolved assassination of some of his close PDP rivals such as Ayo Daramola and Tosin Omojola among others; here was a leader who disbanded a University College of Medicine in order to fund an ‘integrated poultry projects’ with rented chicks which partly accounted for his impeachment by the state House of Assembly on October 16, 2006; here was a man who admitted he fled the state shortly afterwards abandoning all his properties in Government House. “During the seven and half years of my political wilderness”, he told his crowd of supporters during his inauguration, “I was taken to court over what I knew nothing about 59 times, aside the 45 days I spent in Ikoyi Prisons during my trial by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC)”. He did not forget to add “My security and political aides, such as Dayo Okondo, were incarcerated for three and half years without committing any offence”. He was silent on the status of the cases which have dragged on for years like most cases involving PDP men. Here was Ayo Fayose who because of the feeling of ‘self worth’ moved to Labour Party to contest the 2011 Ekiti North Central senatorial seat but was roundly trounced by Senator Babafemi Ojudu. Then the serial carpet crosser moved back to PDP, a party that has claimed what it does best is winning elections and inexplicably trounced a highly rated sitting governor, Fayemi in all the 16 local council areas of the state.

Fayose himself was dazed by his victory. Finding no rational explanation, he went spiritual: “The total glory of these unusual dynamics of history, which are too precise to be taken away from divinity, goes to the Almighty God, the Alpha and the Omega”. To Feyisetan, his wife, “God told me that our return would be done in such a way that will beat people’s imagination… God told me that I should leave him there because he has committed a lot to politics and has yet to reap the dividends”; and to his mother, Prophetess Oluwayose, “The Lord, who brought him this far, is also the one who would bring to fulfillment the good work He has started in him.”

They may all be right. But the issue is that the battle between the church and the state had long been settled on the side of the latter long before liberal democracy became tool for managing society in the western world in the 18th century.

Similarly, Fayose’s inaugural address, like his victory which defied logic was equally a celebration of the absurd. On empowerment, he says he is set to create “an egalitarian society for all Ekitis at home and in the Diaspora”; on education, which he destroyed during his first outing, he says his PDP government is set “to pursue the restoration of the past glory in education”.On security, his “Government shall ensure the take-off of the military formation in Ekiti State”, perhaps to continue with the pacification of Ekiti from where the 12,000 military personnel deployed during his reelection stopped.

On public service, his “government shall review all public service personnel issues including appointment, promotion, and disciplines which were hurriedly effected after the governorship elections”.

Like a military dictator, he directed with immediate effect from the inaugural ground that “the Head of Service is hereby directed to return all officers to their substantive positions as at June 21, 2014”. And finally, his government is “to usher in another era of restoration – of meals to the tables, of smiles to faces, of money to pockets, of soundness of body and mind and of unique infrastructural development – as we resume the steady journey to plenty and prosperity.” He did not say how.

PDP and Fayose by fielding and winning the Ekiti election seemed to have re-defined liberal democracy as an irrational and absurd concept.  But liberal democracy is not only rational, it is a scientific endeavour which became the basis of western civilization centuries back. Long before it became a god worshipped by more than half of the world, Plato had criticized it on the basis that most people are ill-equipped educationally to make informed selection of their leaders. Aristotle had questioned its false assumption of equality of men (okada riders, road transport workers touts with professors). For him, without first educating the people, democracy can only end up producing mediocre like Fayose who proudly asserted in an interview that the people knew he was not a professor before electing him. Liberal democracy has undergone many reforms and today, it thrives more on representation rather than equal participation. Thus Americans elect their leaders through Electoral College and not by equality of voters. There, democracy is known as a tool of ‘gentle men of property’ and in not too distant past, women, slaves and other underprivileged members of society had no voting right. Closer home, in Great Britain, up to 1954, a university graduate vote carries four times the weight of a non-graduate vote.

But alas! Here in Nigeria, we always put the cart before the horse. We manufacture cars without an iron and steel industry and without first acquiring the capacity to manufacture car tyres and car batteries. By 1955, we already had universal adult suffrage ahead of many parts of Europe and Asia including China. When Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto, one of the more far-sighted members of our founding fathers cautioned about the rush for adult suffrage especially as it related to his own people, he was pilloried by the eastern and western regions. If those who claimed to be ready for adult suffrage in 1953 were sincere, they would have teamed up to do what Kenneth Kaunda did with the Northern Rhodesia in East Africa. But then as it is today, our different nationalities have their different agenda.

Besides, liberal democracy is not a tool for scoundrels; it is a tool by which the capitalist class, the barons who owned society manages their society. They decide who governs because they owned the political parties. They ensure good governance in order to protect their investments. They are ready to die for their society. But here, what we have are political parasites sucking and surviving on the blood of the poor. As Professor Bolaji Akinyemi, a former External Affairs Minister recently observed, most Nigerian billionaires made their money through the state. Perhaps this also explains why the followers flood the churches looking for miracles or trying to reap from where they have not sowed.

While there are no free meals in the homes of those who introduced liberal democracy to the world, our own leaders bribe ill-informed voters with our money in the name of stomach infrastructure. Prime Minister Cameron of Great Britain has no official private aircraft because the barons would not pay for such extravagance. He lives in a three bedroom house. Our president on the other hand controls a fleet of about 10 aircrafts while some governors hop around in leased aircrafts or helicopters as Fayose did in a state as compact as Ekiti during his first coming. Our own vice president’s 20 billion mansion is probably still under construction. The rape of our society in the name of liberal democracy does not end there; unlike the western societies, where national assets are kept in trust for future generations, here our leaders who impose themselves on us either as military dictators or as PDP electoral fraudsters, appropriate our national patrimony.

Fayose’s aberration is symptomatic of PDP and its leaders’ exploitation of the concept of liberal democracy to perpetuate evil against our people because they know they can always get away with it by appealing to our religious, ethnic and cultural differences. Deployment of soldiers and police to intimidate political opponents during election and surreptitiously undermining the judiciary by using ill-informed ‘okada’ riders and touts to unleash terror on judges is a betrayal of the ideals of liberal democracy such as check of abuse of power, accountability and impeachment for those who abuse their positions, ideals that are not totally alien to some of our cultures.

Weep not for Ekiti; but weep for the nation.