Tatalo Alamu
IN this column’s only public comment on the Oshiomhole- Obaseki imbroglio, we had admonished the two political gladiators to sheath their swords. As yours sincerely surmised then, the only possible logical outcome of the bitter feud is Mutually Assured Destruction. Having done our duty to nation and humanity, we decided to watch from the side lines as the two camps were egged on by a motley array of political hyenas, literary assassins and tribal principalities.
In the said piece, we urged Obaseki not to succumb to the snares of the famous Oedipus complex in which a son is driven to kill his father in order to marry his mother. Freud believed that all modern feuds between godsons and their godfathers are driven by this roiling psychological and political imperative.
But there are also godfathers who never wish their godsons well out of fear, anxiety and apprehension. It is not heart-warming to be surpassed and outflanked by one’s creation. It takes the most generous and wisest of men to acknowledge this and to live with it. This column drew Oshiomhole’s attention to the pitfalls of the master-builder syndrome.
Famously adopted from Henrik Ibsen’s play, The Master-Builder, it is a situation in which a renowned genius does not wish to be surpassed by his own students and creations. The world of politics and Literature is littered with such fratricidal contentions which only end in tragedy and mutual disgrace.
Since last Thursday after General Buhari wielded the big stick, all is now eerily quiet on the Mid-western front. There is no point belabouring the legality or wisdom of this sledgehammer treatment. You cannot expect a man with a military cast of temperament to stand aloof for long as party and nation descend into anarchy and judicial chaos.
The main combatants have since retreated to lick their wounds. Whether they survive to fight another day is a different matter entirely. Oshiomhole has been dramatically unhorsed with serious collateral damage to his political judgement, moral probity and ability to multi-task in a multi-ethnic coliseum.
In the case of Obaseki, he has survived somehow by carpet-crossing but in vastly diminished circumstances of moral impairment and integrity deficiency. Beyond his Benin moat perimeter, nobody in his right senses will give him any consideration when it comes to future national engagements. Oshiomhole has his faults, but in this particular matter Obaseki has behaved with execrable vileness and arrogant licentiousness. This is not the finest hour for politics in post-military Nigeria.
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