The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Desecration

  • Desecration

    Desecration

    When a Nigerian army calls its operation Python Dance, it may make sense anywhere else in the country but the Southeast. In Igboland, it makes abomination. The army reflected either a disgraceful lack of cultural education or an impunity of desecration.

    The python is a sacred animal in Igboland. To launch an offensive against crime or subversion, the army could have found other metaphors. The long, fat, sly and slithering beast is called Eke believed to be a messenger and agent of the earth goddess, Ala. It is therefore a totem in the east.

    If its army’s python was about soldiers in uniforms starched for combat, tanks poised to roll and the air awaiting orders, then it mocks not IPOB alone but the cultural integrity of the land. It is like pissing on a holy ground, what T.S. Elliot symbolically fleshed out in his play, Murder in the Cathedral. By myth, the Igbo python swallows frogs, not humans. The Nigerian army python has no tailless amphibian in his feral sights. Its nozzles and tanks target Igbos not of the spirit but of the mammalian world. You cannot slaughter a cow in India and make a feast of beef in an open market.

    The military missed the point on the symbolic level. By flexing their superior arms, the soldiers only show a wrong-headed operation. The deployment of the army was one more stumble in handling ethnic entrepreneur Nnamdi Kanu and his IPOB. All it achieved was to further mythicise an opportunist.

    The army and Buhari ought to know that Kanu is no hero in the mould that history shows. He is no Nelson Mandela, who conceived and duelled for free blacks in South Africa. He is no Castro camped in bushes and who saw death before he gave his country life. He is no Patrick Henry of the American Revolution who cried, “give me liberty or give me death.” No Amilcar Cabral. No Che. No John Brown of the anti-slavery headiness who torched Harpers Ferry, launched the Pottawatomie Massacre and was hanged for his cause. Some historians credit Brown as the emotional flame thrower that burned the anti-slavery fervour till all slaves breathed freedom.

    Kanu was a mere London vagrant who caught an opportunity for a happy ‘loot’ at the expense of his people. So, Buhari only is making the man bigger than he is and should be. Mere mortals can turn into heroes by the accident of other people’s folly. It is like the character in Jerzy Kosinski Novel Being There where a nobody who knows nothing has by association risen in wisdom that is not his and suddenly is being projected to run for the U.S. president.

    It is such foolishness that has made the government rush to tag IPOB a terrorist group when they have not even accept the herdsmen as such.

    Kanu was first locked up unnecessarily. The government organised a court action to release him on impossible bail terms that the man accepted before challenging. The man broke the rules. So, the government started court proceedings to get him back behind bars. They know the court dilates. So, the less than smart attorney general Malami and his boss Buhari lack political finesse.

    Rather than wait on end for the court to rule on the bail violations, they could have picked up Kanu on fresh violations. The man committed treason my mounting a guard of honour with so-called Biafran soldiers. On that score, he should not only have been picked up but also a special court could start an expedited trial.

    That way, the so-called Operation Python Dance would have had no rhythm in the east. Again, Abia State Governor and the apostle of local content, Okezie Ikpeazu, would have focussed more on galvanising the state over indigenising our taste through enterprise. The state would not have roiled and no curfew declared. By allowing Kanu linger for so long in the east, Buhari attracted turbulence. He deposited Kanu as unrefined honey that attracted the wave of bees in the form of pedestrian devotees flocking in different parts of the Southeast.

    They allowed the man’s ego to soar because the lower class adored him. The elite courted him not out of love or approval but out of sympathy and yearning for order. The crowd of fawning lower-class followers make people think that IPOB is unstoppable. It is a lie. The Biafra sentiment heaves in every Igbo breast. But Biafra does not always mean separatism in Igboland. It is a metaphor for ethnic pride, no more, no less. The Biafra of IPOB fantasy is a corpse. The followers are only copulating the still and decomposing cadaver.

    So the sentiment is strong, even revolutionary. Here is what a master revolutionary, Vladimir Lenin, says: “A revolution is impossible without a revolutionary situation; furthermore, not every revolutionary situation leads to revolution.” Lenin and his folks expected the Marxist revolution to happen first in Germany. Every such revolution requires a revolutionary elite. Kanu and his IPOB don’t have any such credentials.

    Again, the conditions that helped Ojukwu’s Biafra are non-existent today. The business, intellectual, political and bureaucratic classes are out of sync with him. Hence it was naïve that Buhari should give that group the sort of gravitas that belongs elsewhere.

    The Buhari administration created the Kanu hobgoblin. He now has a task to stop it from moving from irritation to a big rash. That is another desecration of the body politic.

  • Delta monarch relives palace’s desecration

    Delta monarch relives palace’s desecration

    HRH Odjevworo Akpomeyoma Majoroh, Ojeta 11, Ovie of Oruarivie-Abraka, was regal in  a  red frock with a matching beaded  red crown as he sat on a luxurious couch, to receive the  leadership of the apex Urhobo socio-cultural organisation, Urhobo Progressive Union (UPU). They came after an attack on his palace by irate youths.

    But beneath this façade, the king is sad and visibly worried by the events of the past few weeks in his kingdom. He is at a loss why his subjects will turn against him unleashing violence of the most unimaginable proportion against the exalted throne of his ancestors.

    All is not well with Abraka community, Ethiope East Local Government Area, host to the  Delta State University. It is embroiled in crisis following the beheading of an indigene allegedly by Fulani herdsmen.

    The occasion was a fact-finding visit, earlier this week, by the Urhobo Progressive Union (UPU) led by Chief Osiobe Okotie, its first vice-president.

    The royal father described kings in Urhobo land as “an endangered species”, adding not everyone is happy in a system where monarchy is rotational.

    His words: “Kings in Urhobo Land are an endangered species. People are extremely jealous of their status, especially in areas where kingship is rotated, everybody is not happy.  This was an excuse for them to do what they wanted to do.”

    He said he felt pained by allegations that he had not done enough for his people, adding: “It is unfortunate that my own people will say I am not doing enough. I know what I have done. I know my contributions to the community.”

    He said the most disturbing aspect of the whole episode was the deliberate attempt to desecrate the throne by bringing a corpse to the palace, as it is a taboo for a king to see a dead person.

    His words: “The youths knew that traditionally it is taboo for a king to see dead bodies and that dead body is forbidden in a palace.”

    He said following the desecration of the palace grounds by the actions of the youths , he had to stay indoors for the whole day until the palace was ritually cleansed

    According to him, trouble started in the morning hour of the fateful day after he was briefed by the President-General of the community of a murder of his subject allegedly by Fulani herdsmen.

    He said: “What happened was on that day which was a Tuesday at about 10.30a.m the president-general briefed me of yet another incident at our farmland Ovre that Fulani herdsmen killed someone. I directed that he got the President of that community and incident the case at the Police Station. I did not get the details that day as I was heading to our ancestral shrine as it is our traditional market day. Upon my return I was briefed on the matter. I ordered that they should get the police and recover the corpse for safety reasons; before I knew it my personal assistant came in to inform me that the youths from my community were moving en masse to the palace with the corpse of the boy. I called the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) to come with reinforcements. I also put a call to the president-general and the youth leader who informed me that they were outside the palace fence. The vigilante group was also on ground outside the palace. After a while I heard protests outside and the protesters started hitting the gate .I was calm and thinking of the next course of action when I heard the protesters breaking windows panes in the palace. My entire living room was filled with splinters of glasses and guns were booming outside.”

    The monarch said the protesters destroyed vehicles parked in the palace grounds, and were in the process of setting the palace, including him and his guests on fire, when the military intervened.

    He said after the youths fled they split into two groups, adding that one group headed towards the Hausa quarters and attacked its residents.

    He said a major grouse of the youths was that he has refused to supply them with ammunitions to fight the herdsmen ,adding “ Some persons want me to provide ammunitions for them, but I ask am I involve myself in illegality to solve this problem”.

    The royal father accused security agencies of being aware of the activities of the herdsmen, but did nothing to check their activities.

    He said he was awaiting government action following the intervention of the state government, adding that he hoped that meetings between the Hausa/Fulani leadership and his community and government would provide a workable solution to the problem.

    President-General, Abraka community, Dr. Tedwins Emudainowho described the Ovre-Oruarivie forest as “Sambissa Forest”, claiming that with over 2000 herdsmen committing various atrocities ranging from kidnapping, armed robbery and other crimes the situation was a keg of gunpowder waiting to explode.

    He said the immediate cause of the crisis was the beheading of Solomon Ejoor who along with three persons attempted to rescue their mother trapped by Fulani herdsmen in her farm, adding that since 2012 no fewer than 18 persons have been killed in the community.

    Chief Osiobe Okotie thanked God for sparing the life of the monarch, adding that the UPU was in the process of convening a forum to sensitise youths to respect constituted authority.

    He urged the Federal and State governments to “do something urgently about the Abraka situation before it gets out of hand.”

    His words: “We want to use this opportunity to send a message across to the federal/state government to do something urgently about the Abraka situation before it gets out of hand. We cannot sit and watch our people being slaughtered .The UPU is using this medium to send a message to President Muhammadu Buhari to take appropriate action because information getting to us is that the area where this dastardly act occur there are over 2000 herdsmen fully armed raping our women, our daughters. They have taken over our lands .We do not know their mission. It is the responsibility of the government whether federal or state to ensure that the lives of its citizens are protected .The government should as a matter of urgency step into this matter so that people will not be forced to either protect themselves or do anything otherwise, so we want to avoid that .UPU is watching, our eyes are on Abraka.”

  • Jonathan and PDP’s desecration of Yoruba Land

    President Goodluck Jonathan seems to have taken personal abode in the southwest in the last three weeks. With little or nothing to sell to a people he has treated with absolute contempt in the last six years, he has, according to his political detractors, been distributing loads of naira and dollars to youth, religious and women groups, and even traditional leaders. And for his pains and despite his abysmal record of performance, is counting on these groups to win the coming presidential election with farcical endorsement after endorsement.

    We have seen him surrounded by traditional rulers receiving blessing with royal walking sticks menacingly pointed at him. Last Monday, of all days, his paid supporters, led by OPC leaders, alleged to have received N9b contract along with others, visited untold sufferings on Lagosians as they ‘wielded broken bottles and knives; destroyed bill boards while walking, on foot and in about 100 buses on the ever busy Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Ikorodu Road to Teslim Balogun Stadium in Surulere’.

    Penultimate Tuesday, PDP governors had complimented the president’s desperate efforts. They assembled in Eko Le Meridian hotel; Victoria Island where, as an answer to PDP’s six years of baleful legacy, ditched out hideous lies, told horrific tales and made odious comparisons. They spoke of Jonathan and PDP commitment to democratic values. They claimed: “PDP abhors corruption in all its ramifications”. They insisted: “PDP has done a lot in the fighting of corruption since the inception of democracy to date.” They therefore sought Yoruba support to ensure the “Sustenance of Democratic Values and National Development”.  These PDP governors seem to have forgotten they were not addressing Nigeriens, Chadians or Cameroonians but the direct victims of 16 years of PDP mismanagement; of documented PDP mindless looting of our common wealth through such self serving policy thrusts as PPPRA and fuel subsidy regime, privatization programme described by the House of Representatives’ report as ‘giving away of national assets at next to nothing”, and monetization policy that allowed the sharing of our national patrimony dating back to the colonial period by few members of the governing elite and their friends.

    At the head of PDP governor’s team was Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom, the generous giver who has acquired all professional honours and chieftaincy titles money and influence can buy. Others include Reverend Jonah Jang of Plateau who lost the original Governors Forum election by 16 to 19 but lacking the grace to concede defeat, crowned himself winner and proceeded to church to thank God for giving him victory. There was   Babangida Aliyu of Niger, the self styled ‘Chief servants of the people,’ who talks more from both sides of the mouth; Sule Lamido of Jigawa, Obasanjo anointed successor to Jonathan whose ambition collapsed following EFCC arrest of his two sons for money laundry. Also on the team was Olusegun Mimiko of Ondo, the serial defector who is often attracted by the highest bidder and of course there was Ayo Fayose, a former impeached governor of Ekiti who has found his way back to the Government House through a flawed election as shown by the ongoing ‘Ekitigate’ and who is yet to establish his innocence after 53 appearances in court over his  EFCC charges of  mismanagement of N19b  Ekiti state fund.

    Speaking at the event, Governor Akpabio talked vaguely about what he termed the president and PDP achievements on war against corruption. But for Babangida Aliyu, the Chief ‘servant of the people’, probably realizing Jonathan is a bad product, chose to attack APC and Buhari, its flag bearer.  APC, a party he once hobnobbed with, he said was ‘a product of hate, frustration and anger’. He accused some of its leaders of ‘corruption’. He alleged money was used to influence the emergence of Buhari as APC candidate. And finally, he mischievously claimed Buhari was planning to spend only one term and this according to him will amount to shortchanging the north that should ordinarily be entitled to two terms.

    I think Nigerians and northerners in particular should be ashamed of leaders like Babangida Aliyu. Here is a northern leader who is unwilling to confront President Jonathan he had accused of reneging on an agreement with northern governors but now wants northerners to believe he is fighting their battle by fabricating lies to stop Buhari, another northerner contesting on the platform of another party. Groveling Babangida Aliyu not too long ago told Nigerians that he was the custodian of the secret document allegedly signed by President Jonathan to spend only six years. If he needed help, Obasanjo who publicly accused Jonathan of reneging on an undertaking to spend six years has strengthened Aliyu’s case.

    But curiously, Aliyu, who was part of northern governors who sold out in 2011 when Jonathan secured PDP ticket by default, Aliyu who is the leader of today’s incoherent Northern governors;  and who like all PDP leading light, are dealers and wheelers, now says they and Jonathan, their nemesis, are the true friends of the north while Buhari who most Nigerians today are counting on to rescue our nation is the enemy of the north. He is saying the interest of the north can only be protected by stopping Buhari a northerner from becoming president and not by stopping Jonathan he had claimed betrayed an agreement he signed with northern governors. With friends like Aliyu Babangida and the groveling northern governors, the north doesn’t need enemies.

    Just like incoherent Aliyu Babangida, Sule Lamido avoided dissipating energy on a bad product which will be a hard sell among enlightened people of Lagos and south west. He chose to introduce a game of mischief instead. He accused Buhari of keeping quiet as chairman of PTF while Abacha looted the nation’s treasury.  But Nigerians know Buharis’s oversight functions, as chairman of PTF did not cover the CBN. In any case, it is now facts of our history that the then CBN governor and Abacha’s minister of Finance, Chief Michael Ani aided Abacha in looting the CBN. Lamido avoided the painful fact that today, our country is adjudged one of the most corrupt nations on earth and that he has been part of PDP’s 16 years of locust. If we needed any proof of that, the politically motivated arrest of his two sons for money laundering at a time he expressed interest in the presidency was all president Jonathan needed to remind Nigerians that Lamido is a loyal member of PDP family that lives on the blood of Nigerians.

    As for Ayo Fayose, he has never been interested in selling Jonathan. He is haunted more by the prospect of a Buhari presidency. And we can understand his apprehensions. It is only under a Jonathan presidency we can have an Ayo Fayose with his liabilities, who but for the slow pace at which the wheel of justice grinds in our country,’ -apologies to President Jonathan, could have been behind bars, pontificating over how and who rules Nigeria. And Olusegun Mimiko, his Ondo state counterpart, whose attempt at dragging Yoruba Obas to partisan politics is a reflection of his lack of understanding of Yoruba culture, has nothing he holds sacred. If Buhari wins the coming election, as a survivalist who believes in nothing, he will crawl back to APC.

    On March 28, President Jonathan will reap the wages of investing on miscreants and those the Yoruba describe as ‘akotileta’ (seller of clan for a pot of porridge). As Awo observed in his autobiography, the Yoruba will not vote for you just because you are Yoruba if you have no manifesto that maps out strategies to address their future fears and anxieties. Those miscreants who are accomplices in today’s desecration of our land must remember Yoruba have a way of ensuring those who sow the wind reap the whirl wind, no matter how long it takes.

  • Desecration of Ekiti State judiciary

    The anarchical conduct of some politicians and their thugs for two days last week, within the precincts of the High court of Ado-Ekiti, Ekiti state, is most reprehensible. Agreed that some politicians in Nigeria are not very different from street hooligans and bandits by their conduct, yet, until last Tuesday and Thursday I had thought that their peculiar madness will not extend to the hallowed grounds of the courts. But obviously nothing is sacred for these characters. To show that our country is not a lawless country, the Governor of Ekiti State, Mr. Kayode Fayemi and the President Goodluck Jonathan must exercise their constitutional responsibilities to defend law abiding citizens and officials of government, in their capacity as heads of the executive arms of government in the state and the federation, respectively.

    Also the governor-elect of Ekiti State, Mr. Ayodele Fayose, who has been fingered by Governor Fayemi, as allegedly being responsible for the mayhem that has led to dusk to dawn curfew in the state, after the murder of citizen Omolafe Aderiye, must do all in his powers to clear his name. Otherwise, his tenure as the next Governor would be tainted, even before it starts.  Unfortunately for him, he has a huge task, if the reports that the hooligans descended on the high court officials, lawyers and the general public, following the ruling of Justice Isaac Ogunyemi, that his honourable court has the jurisdiction to determine whether Mr. Fayemi had the locus to participate in the last gubernatorial election, is true. To compound the governor-elect’s challenge, the second round of mayhem last Thursday, again took place the day the governor-elect visited the election petition Tribunal hearing the case instituted by the All Progressive Congress against his election on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party.

    Considering that Mr. Fayose has stridently denied the allegations, there is the need for a thorough investigation of those responsible for disrupting the peace and tranquility of Ekiti State, particularly her judiciary. Regrettably, with the security agencies allegedly compromised, and the state and federal authority, partisans in the crisis, such an enquiry will be a tall order. But regardless, it is in the interest of Ekiti people and our democracy that those responsible for assaulting High court Judges, Justices Akintayo and Adeyeye, within the confines of the High Court premises; and the murder of Mr. Aderiye are brought to speedy justice. For it is better imagined the consequences, if Judges henceforth determine their cases, in a manner to avoid being molested by interested parties.

     

    Re: Rochas and local council aspirants

    The case I made here, penultimate Tuesday, imploring Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State, to, as a matter of honour and constitutionalism conduct the long awaited local government election in the state, has elicited some interesting reactions. One of the victims, who reacted anonymously, sent me the time table for the aspirants, starting from 2011, up to this year. I also got some text messages tending to support the status quo. First the aspirant, who wrote:

    In 2011, the aspirants were asked to familiarise themselves with the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA)(then Governor Okorocha’s party) at the grassroots.

    In 2012, the aspirants were instructed to attend ICAPS/IMSU leadership training to be acquainted with legislative rudiments and leadership for 14 weeks. They were given certificates.

    Last year, the aspirants to the position of Chairmen were asked to pay N100,000, under Governor Okorocha’s new party, the All Progressive Congress (APC).

    This year, the same aspirants were asked to pay N50,000, for intent form, N10,000 to Local Government Party secretariat and N5,000 to state secretariat for administrative services.

    Again this year, they were asked to tour the communities within the local government under context, to solicit for votes for mock-election, mobilise membership for the APC and sensitise electorate to come out en mass to register for Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) permanent voters’ card when it starts.

    The government of Imo State slated September 1, for the mock-election, but the election never held. The mock-election was designated as a prelude to party primary election to determine the party’s candidates.

    According to the aspirant, as at the time he sent the timetable, which in my earlier piece, I had likened to a journey to nowhere, akin to what in local parlance amounts to entering a ‘one chance vehicle’; there is no date for local government election in Imo State.

     

    The other interesting reaction by text, read:

    I thank you immensely for your article on the above subject matter. First of all, I will linked (like) you to know that Local Government in Imo State before the coming of Rochas were conduits of siphoning money that belong to the people. None of this councils executed meaningful projects like what we see in southwest part of this country. Funds for local governments were like personal estates, none of the chairmen live within the local government. All of them live expensively in Owerri, moving around with armed policemen as if they are something else.

    They only appear in LG once it is time to share allocations. There is a local government (LG) headed by a woman. I make bold to say that the husband of this woman was a Senator for good 16 years, with nothing to show for it, yet when allocation is received in LG, it is shared in their bedroom and when he travels everybody must wait until he comes back to base before anything can be done. So, in as much as we want LG elections to be held, we must first of all clean up the system and be ready for it.

     Uzoka  08057875094