The death of Ondo State’s Governor Rotimi Akeredolu last Wednesday has created nightmarish scenarios for politicians in the state. The worst hit are those interested in contesting next year’s governorship election. The least hit is probably the new governor, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, whose supporters had earlier wanted him to be declared acting governor, if not outright governor, on the grounds of Mr Akeredolu’s incapacitation. A little over two weeks ago the new governor was declared acting governor, a position he had hankered after to the annoyance of those who empathised with the ailing former governor. Supposing that the former governor was probably going to be bedfast for many more months, and perhaps until well into 2024, the new governor needed the acting governor position to strengthen his hands in the coming electoral contest. The other aspirants, on the other hand, needed the former governor alive, or even better, back in office, to help create a level playing field for all the contestants. Mr Akeredolu’s death and Mr Aiyedatiwa’s ascendancy will, therefore, tax the ingenuity of Ondo’s governorship aspirants in ways they had despaired to countenance.
Clips after video clips have emerged showing how enamoured of Mr Aiyedatiwa the former governor was. He eulogised him as his potential successor, and with folkloric ease lauded his deputy’s name as pregnant with meanings and spiritual import. The new governor, who was then deputy governor, eagerly lapped up the praise. But in a few crazy months, perhaps a reflection of the delicate character of Mr Aiyedatiwa, the sickness of the former governor triggered something unwholesome and unsavoury in him. He was impatient, believed to be unfeeling, unscrupulous, and politically unskillful. He was unable to show convincing proof that he empathised with the debilitated former governor, and in statement after statement, and one action after another, he fumbled into deeper ethical quandary, while his men secretly advocated the remorseless application of the constitution. Eventually, the constitution was applied; and to the relief of Mr Aiyedatiwa, even before he finished savouring that little triumph, the former governor passed away, leaving the coast clear.
Whether anybody likes it or not, Mr Aiyedatiwa is now governor. He is expected to show his mettle and demonstrate whether he has the character and intuition to govern the state. His lack of surefootedness had divided the state and immersed it in needless controversy as the former governor battled prostate cancer; he will now be called upon to heal the wounds of division, refute allegations of his perfidy and insensitivity, and pursue his 2024 governorship ambition in ways that are not offensive, desperate and egotistic. Given his antecedents, this is a tall order. But as this column indicated last week, he must simply rise above the mediocrity he seemed accustomed to, and surround himself with exemplary characters and advisers who will either help to mould him anew or at least chaperon him into playing a leadership role that seems at first glance bigger than him. Many leading political figures in the state view him with an eerie wariness, and the ruling party in the state, the All Progressives Congress (APC), can’t find the equanimity and the resolve to trust him. How he transcends those divisions and dissipates the distrust in which he is held will go a long way in demonstrating whether he can pleasantly surprise those casting furtive glances at his unorthodox politics.
A few resignations by the late governor’s aides and at least one commissioner have attempted to take the shine off Mr Aiyedatiwa’s ascendancy. The resignations were neither insulting nor tied to anything the governor did or didn’t do; but the undertones were clear. They will, however, not have the force or amplitude of the resignations that plagued the political manoeuvres of the Rivers State governor, Siminalayi Fubara. In Rivers where the governor attempted to assert himself against his allegedly overbearing godfather, the governor took extra-constitutional steps to arrest the impeachment moves against him. Even then, the resignations were dismissed as the exaggerated actions of pampered and prejudiced appointees. In Ondo, despite the governor’s machinations, he had the constitution on his side through and through. No resignation, even if it involved every appointee of the former governor, would raise eyebrows. If they did not resign, the new governor would be at liberty, the constitution firmly on his side, to reshuffle the executive council and retain those he can trust. One of the Ondo resignees had spoken touchingly and in sepulchral tones of his loyalty to the late governor, but even if necromancy had the force of law, Mr Akeredolu could not be a living godfather in the grave. In Ondo, an era has passed; it remains to be seen what kind of moral and political tapestry the new governor would weave for the new era.
In the months ahead, as the state braces for the next governorship primaries and election, Mr Aiyedatiwa will have a lot of policy issues and administrative obstacles to contend with. President Bola Tinubu and the APC party leadership in Abuja have charged him to unite the party and deal with Ondo wisely as well as offer the state excellent leadership that delivers the dividends of democracy. It is unclear how he will proceed in those onerous tasks, for the months ahead will be taken up almost wholly by the politics of next year’s governorship election rather than the task of development. The governor has managed, perhaps not intentionally, to set the cat among the pigeons by his open desperation to succeed his former boss. What no one can tell immediately is whether enough functionaries in the party and the state’s elite have been offended by his clamorousness. Yet if the temperament of Nigerian politics is taken into cognisance, the governor may by patronage and guile, and perhaps a little dose of ruthlessness, draw a significant number of important people into his camp, enough to tilt the scale against other governorship contenders. For a man and politician who only needed to bide his time early in Mr Akeredolu’s battle with cancer, but chose to go for broke, could he be trusted to produce the guile and wisdom needed to gain the upper hand in the contest for the minds of the electorate?
As governor, Mr Aiyedatiwa occupies a vantage position in the coming battle. But his co-contenders, some four or five of them, have also put their hands to the plough and will not be inclined to look back. Some of them have some measure of support in Abuja; they will give the governor a run for his money, and match him battleground for battleground, and naira for naira. All contenders will try their best and worst to seduce the national leadership of the party and buy the local party chapter. Whether they succeed will depend on the cheapness or expensiveness of the consciences being bought. What is clear is that there will be some sort of trading, far worse than horse-trading. The flip side is whether Ondo’s political personalities who chafed at Mr Aiyedatiwa’s methods are scandalised enough to double down on their intransigent view of the new governor’s duplicity. Should a critical mass of political leaders in the state remain attached to the moral argument against the governor, they will be loth to put him in the State House knowing full well that once in power, he could transmogrify into something nastier than he exhibited during the former governor’s sickness. They could, however, also wonder whether it would not make more sense to put their own APC monster in office, assuming that description fits, than put a hostile and unamenable lamb from the opposition PDP in office.Human memory can, however, be fickle. Mr Aiyedatiwa may not have been exemplary during Mr Akeredolu’s sickness, but if he can begin to conciliate his opponents, massage the egos of the state chapter of the APC, persuade and retain as commissioners some appointees of his predecessor, and begin to make high-sounding and lofty moral statements, even if untrue, the party and the electorate could begin to doubt their own judgements and conclusions about him. He has less than a year to make a great impression on Ondo in terms of projects and bribes; but with barely four months to the governorship primary and 10 months to the election, the state has become an excruciatingly tight and labyrinthine maze only a wise ruler can navigate successfully. Perhaps he is incapable of pulling a rabbit from the hat or demonstrating that he has any wisdom left in his repository. Should he do the unimaginable in appealing to the party and the people, they will forget his dark side, excuse his domestic troubles gingerly alluded to in Akure’s beer parlour gossips as nothing extraordinarily different from his predecessor’s termagant better half, and even begin to defend his idiosyncratic impatience as customary of leaders everywhere.
Mr Aiyedatiwa has now become lucky, as his first name suggests. He replaced the luckless Agboola Ajayi as deputy governor, and almost from the outset his mentor touted him as a worthy and favoured successor. But at his swearing-in, where he made a deplorable Freudian slip about the state heaving a sigh of relief, his supporters ululated in triumph and booed his opponents. It was an incredibly churlish display indicative of the unbridgeable divisions in the party and government. There were only a few Akeredolu men in the hall where he was sworn in; most stayed away. If his supporters’ attitude to his opponents is a reflection of his conviction, then the APC in Ondo State may be headed for a turbulent and acrimonious time. APC leaders in Abuja will be anxious to avoid turmoil in the state; they must hope that the governor will be on the same page with them. Both the party and the governor need that miracle; for while the party is not yet tuned to operate at an exquisitely efficient and calculating level, Mr Aiyedatiwa seems even less inclined to political panache or discreteness. Whatever happens, the next few months in Ondo will engender a titanic battle between the governor and other governorship aspirants who are undeterred and unfazed by his office, power or money.
