Moseyn Ekiw was topsy-turvy. As a junior minister in the immediate Federal Administration, he was extremely close to the wife of the President who ensured he got almost everything he wanted. In return, he was generous to her using public funds meant for the development of the primary education.
At a point, he was paying her $1m every month. There were other kinds of gifts too. Cars, houses and so on. He had done this with no fear in his heart; after all, their party, the Umbrella Peoples Party (UPP), was meant to be in power for 50 years in the first instance. And as at that time, the party had only done a decade and a half.
But things changed, the party was booted out of power at the federal level. A new party formed some two years before the last general elections, Broom Revolution Party (BRP), took the reins of power in Naigra. He stopped being a minister too but was lucky to become governor of Waters State after fighting a legal battle that initially looked like he was going to lose.
Reading the newspapers and watching discussions on television stations brought him nothing but sadness. Topsy-turvy was the best way to describe his mood, especially when alone. Outside, he still put on the usual strong man’s mien.
As he sat on the two-seater in his Quiet Room, his phone rang. He ignored the call. He grabbed a copy of The Country, that newspaper he liked to describe as useless all because of its critical stand on his administration.
On its front page was a detailed report about the former President’s wife’s messy probe over some millions of dollars found in some accounts which she claimed belonged to her. As one who was giving her huge sums in dollars regularly when he was a junior minister, Ekiw was afraid that at some point, the investigators might stumble on facts linking him to the whole messy deals. And that was the last thing he needed. Kidnappers were making his life hell; cultists were doing theirs; and armed robbers were not left out of the drama that his life had become since he took over from Timiro Ihceama.
As he made to drop the newspaper, his phone rang again. He picked it.
“Good morning your Excellency,” said Ogbogboro Maxwell, the leader of the umbrella body of youth from Water-lodged territories.
“Good morning Max,” Ekiw replied.
“Your Excellency, I need to come and see you right away. As a matter of fact, I am right in front of your lodge. Tell the security to let me in. It is urgent I see you right away and it is not something I can discuss on phone. We don’t know who is tapping our calls…”
“Okay, they will let you in and lead you to where I am…”
“Thanks your Excellency…”
Ekiw grabbed his phone and called his Chief Security Officer. Five minutes later, Max was sitting in the Quiet Room. The first thing that caught his attention was the front page report in The Country.
He grabbed it and said: “This is why I have come to see you, Your Excellency. We can’t allow this to continue. These people cannot continue to rubbish our former First Family. We must stop them…”
“How?” Ekiw asked.
“Let’s occupy the offices of the Commission Against Financial Crimes. We will start with the one here and later we will move to the federal capital. I will mobilise youths and we will occupy till we are assured the probe of the former first family will be stopped. We will make it look like a spontaneous thing, not influenced by anybody and we will get the media to cover it adequately. Your media aide can work with us in the background.”
“And do you think that will achieve anything?”
“Your Excellency, there is no harm in trying. We will present our case like that of victimization and add a tinge of threat to it. We will threaten to make the country ungovernable if our icons are continuously harassed. We will remind them that if the former first family had tried to stay put in power, no one would have been able to stop him. We will deliver a letter to them letting them know what peace in our region means to the country.”
Ekiw thought of the proposal for some time and eventually gave his blessing.
“I will send N30 million to your account. How fast can we do it?”
“If I get the money now, we can do it today…”
“You will have the money in five minutes…”
“Okay then, let me go and start the mobilisation so that the protest can take place in the next one hour…”
“Don’t forget to mobilise reporters too. We must get the message out there. Get someone to co-ordinate the social media too…”
“No wahala, your Excellency.”
Max took his leave. Ekiw grabbed his phone and called his media aide.
“Get in touch with Max. He will brief you about what you need to do for him,” he said before his aide could even say yes sir.
Five hours later, he tuned the television to Newstrack and there was Max with a big mega phone and hundreds of youths in front of the office of the Commission Against Financial Crimes. He increased the volume to hear his statement.
“This nonsense must stop. You guys must stop harassing our icon. Mama contributed a lot to this country. This is not how to pay her back. Whatever money you find in her accounts were gifts and to the best of our knowledge taking gifts has not become an offence in our statute books. Our culture as Africans even frowns at people who reject gifts.
“If you people claim to be fair, then probe her predecessors too and make their accounts’ statements public. Picking on her alone in itself is corruption. You people are corrupting the anti-corruption war and that shows you are confused and need to be re-directed.
“If this nonsense against our most important female icon does not stop in the next few days, we will occupy your headquarters and nothing can stop us. And as we are occupying your headquarters, we will also cripple the economy by ensuring no one pumps a single barrel of oil in our region. This country belongs to all of us and we need to be fairly treated. You conspired against our region by pushing our man out of power. Now, you will not even allow them enjoy their lives outside power. This is arrant nonsense and it must stop and if you refuse to stop it, we will force you to do so…”
Max’s performance impressed Ekiw. He spoke well, he told himself and called his media aide.
“How are we doing on the social media?”
“We are trending sir…”
“Take over lindaikeji and other blogs too with comments. You know how you do it now. And also flood our own blog. That one you started when I was minister,” he instructed an dropped the call before the poor chap could soak in the message.
H e was soon on his bed trying to sleep, but sleep he could not. He caught the image of someone who had murdered sleep and throw it out of the window. But he was used to battles and this one he would fight.
He got out of bed, put a call through to the former president’s wife and they chatted about the whole development for some time.
“You must continue the protest. We are in this together. Shebi, you know,” the ex-president’s wife told Ekiw.
“I know ma and I can’t afford to leave it to you alone. Not even now that you are not in the country. I have to take up the battle discretely. Next week, Max and his boys will match on Abuja. We are already working on it…”
“Okay, thank you. We go talk later. Make I go sleep…”
“Sweet dreams ma,” he said as he hung up.
He grabbed some sleeping pills and flushed them down his system. Five minutes later, he was in the land of the living death. But, he would wake up to face his fear.
