A chairmanship aspirant on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Amuwo Odofin Local Government Area of Lagos State, Marine Capt. Adebayo Dosunmu, has felicitate with the Jagaban Borgu and the party’s National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, APC stalwarts at the Federal, state and local government levels on the celebration of this year’s Christmas.
The politician wished his people in Amuwo Odofin a Merry Christmas and prosperous New Year.
Dosunmu noted that Asiwaju Tinubu remained a political icon and legendary leader, having risen from a humble background to provide credible leadership for the masses and establish a new socio-political order founded on the rule of law.
He prayed that in 2017, Asiwaju Tinubu would continue his inspirational leadership and service to mankind, which had always been his traits.
He also prayed Allah to guide and provide the resources for the nation’s progress to the party’s leadership.
Dosunmu urged APC faithful to remain steadfast “as we begin the journey for a prosperous 2017”.
Tag: politician
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Politician greets Tinubu, APC faithful at Christmas
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Gunmen kidnap Akwa Ibom politician
Unidentified gunmen have kidnapped a prominent politician and businessman, Mr Amaete Akpan Ntuk from Ikot Abasi Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom state.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) learnt that Ntuk was abducted with his wife around 7pm on Saturday, on his way home from Ibom International Airport.
NAN also gathered that the incident occurred at a village in Mkpat Enin Local Government area, near Ikot Abasi.
It was learnt that they were returning home after attending the inauguration of the new Managing Director of the Niger-Delta Development Commission NDDC, Obong Nsima Ekere in Abuja on Friday.
The Police Public Relations Officer in Akwa Ibom ASP Cordelia Nwawe, confirmed the kidnapping, adding that investigation on the incident has commenced.
Ntuk was a former Chairman of Ikot Abasi Local Government Area of the State in 1990, under the National Republican Convention.
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APC leaders pleaded for my return – Osoba
Former Governor Olusegun Osoba on Tuesday said the public misconstrued what happened at his Bourdilon home, Ikoyi – Lagos, last Sunday when the leaders of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the Southwest met.
In attendance at the meeting included the National Leader of the APC, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu; Governor of Oyo State, Senator Abiola Ajimobi; Governor of Lagos State, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode who was represented by his deputy, Dr. Mrs. Oluranti Adebule and former Governor of Ekiti State, Otunba Niyi Adebayo.
Others are former interim National Chairman of APC, Chief Bisi Akande; APC National Vice Chairman, South West, Chief Pius Akinyelure and Senator Gbenga Obadara and ex – Deputy Governor, Prince Segun Adesegun.
But Governor Ibikunle Amosun, his Deputy, Princess Yetunde Onanuga and leaders of the Party in Ogun State were visibly absent and no explanation given for their absence.
Osoba who broke his silence on the matter, said while people kept saying that he hosted the Southwest leaders of APC in his home since the news of the meeting broke; the truth of the matter was that it was them that came to plead with him to return to the APC family.
The Akirogun of Egbaland who made this known in his remarks at the public presentation of the book: Alake of Egbaland, in Abeokuta, the Ogun state capital, and vaguely blamed the press for the public misconception.
The 127 page book bearing Five chapters, was authored by the foremost Egba politician and industrialist, Chief Alani Bankole, popularly called Caterpillar and was reviewed by the pioneer Vice – Chancellor of Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijagun, Prof. Olukayode Oyesiku.
Osoba noted that the pleading by the APC leaders in Yorubaland for him to return to the progressive fold have been on and still continued, adding that two prominent traditional rulers had also lend their voices in that direction.
The ex – governor said the occasion of the book launch was not a time for political speech making, adding that it is better left for a later date in future.
And in a brief encounter with the press shortly after launching the book with half a million naira, Osoba said he is a founding member of APC and would remain a progressive politician till the end of his sojourn on earth.
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Rivers bye election: No politician will be spared – IGP
The Inspector General of Police, Mr. Solomon Arase Wednesday spoke tough ahead of this Saturday re-run elections in Rivers state.
He warned politicians who wish to foment trouble to be prepared to face the wrath of law.
Re-run elections will hold in 37 constituencies involving the three senatorial districts, 12 federal constituencies and 22 state constituencies.
Arase who spoke at a joint briefing with Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mohammed Yakubu said a comprehensive security analysis have been conducted with some trouble spots and individuals identified.
The identified individuals he further said have been placed under watch and should they cross the threshold; the police will be forced to take action.
He added that apart from the deployment of 6,000 police personnel, special protection units, explosive ordinance department, federal special anti-robbery squad, operatives of the criminal intelligence and investigation department, counterterrorism unit and marine section of the force are being deployed.
IGP maintained that the police force is committed to guiding the nation’s democracy.
He however assured that the security architecture that will be put in place in place will be civil enough to protect all political actors across the party divides.He said: “at this juncture, let me note that the intelligence unit of the Nigeria police has conducted a comprehensive security analysis if Rivers state. The areas likely to present major security threat as well as individuals who are poised to make themselves available as political thugs to threaten the peaceful conduct of the electoral process have been identified.
“I can assure you that appropriate mechanisms have been duly emplaced to prevent the anti-democratic elements from manifesting their criminal intent.”
While noting that identified trouble makers will not be picked for now, IGP however said that the individuals have been placed under watch and will be forced to pick them up when they cross the threshold set for them.
He added, “our democracy has evolved to a level where political gladiators and electorates should allow morality, integrity, genuine national passion, service and above all, the dictates of paw to guide their actions. The days when political power is attained through the rule of violence rather than the rule of law and democratic value s are fading and our political actors that believe in turning citizens to political thugs and cannon folders to bear the fatal brunt of their political ambition should allow such thoughts to fade henceforth or be prepared to face the wrath of justice.”
He also used the opportunity to announce the restriction of movement during the re-run elections.
On why no political offender has been prosecuted so far in the country, Mr. Arase noted that the police is handicapped since it is not a criminal issue.
Meanwhile, INEC Chairman has assured the state of the commission’s preparedness to conduct the elections.
Yakubu said 24,930 ad-hoc staff have been engaged as part of the efforts to ensure a successful conduct on Saturday. He further noted that training has commenced for the ad-hoc members.
INEC Chair also revealed that none of the electoral officers currently posted as head of local government offices in the state will participate I the election.
While noting that non sensitive materials have been moved to the state, he announced that sensitive materials will be deployed to the state today.
Yakubu also used the opportunity to announce that card readers will be used for accreditation.
He also reiterated his call for the establishment of electoral offence tribunal.
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Ekwunife, a fair-weather politician
SIR: “Most importantly, our deep concern is her record which showed that she dumps political parties at will, leaving the parties in its wake factionalized – from the Peoples Democratic Party to All Progressives Grand Alliance, to Progressive Peoples Alliance, back to PDP or vice versa and now to APC. She is more or less a fair-weather-hen.”
That was the verdict delivered by the All Progressives Congress (APC) Senatorial Screening Committee a couple of weeks ago as it rejected the candidacy of Uche Ekwunife on it party’s platform for the Anambra Central Senatorial District.
Last month, the Court of Appeal had annulled Ekwunife’ election as senator. The court ordered that a fresh election be conducted within 90 days. She has been scrambling since then to return to the Senate. Ekwunife had won a seat in the Senate as a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, but something funny happened and the lady refused to return to the party – or vice versa.
Well, let’s hear it from madam herself: “My good people of Anambra Central, the outcome of what we witnessed was a conspiracy between some elements in PDP and the state government who were panicking over what they referred to as my rising profile.”
Strictly speaking, this is not exactly true. Ekwunife bolted the PDP because that party advertised in four national newspapers that it would not participate in further political elections or congresses including the Anambra Central Senatorial election re-run until its national spokesman, Olisa Metuh, who was back then still grooming his now luxurious beard within the confines of a lonely cell in Kuje prison, is released. Nigerian politicians don’t play that kind of game. Party primaries are time-bound; so the lady quickly moved on.
Before she moved on to another party however, Ekwunife had to tidy up some loose ends. She claimed, “…some leaders from South East called me on phone and said that since they have nullified the election and requested for fresh election, why don’t we use this opportunity to play national politics?” So Ekwunife had to reach out to the APC. You see, whilst previously campaigning for the Senate as a PDP candidate, Ekwunife happily referred to the APC as a ‘terrorist party.’ She had since apologised to the APC. She said she was only joking when she made that comment.
In just seven years, Mrs Ekwunife changed political parties four times. By 2007, Ekwunife was in the House of Representatives courtesy of the PDP. Four years later, her nose to the ground, she followed the political wind of change in Anambra, dumped the PDP and sailed into the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA). Before her election into the Senate last March, she had twice contested the governorship of Anambra state under PPA and APGA and lost both times.
Now she’s tried to follow another wind of change back to the Senate, but the APC screening committee has only gone and said no!
Where Ngige could not sweep well with an APC broom because the people are not too sold on APC’s seemingly segregationist policies, Ekwunife was desperate enough to want to try. Alas, even the APC says Iyom is not good enough for them.
Mrs Ekwunife now finds herself effectively stranded. What’s a gal to do…?
- Michael Egbejumi-David
demdem@hotmail.co.uk
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Pastor, hunter, politician
The profile of the new Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) has brought into bold relief why many wanted the Buhari administration to appoint one from the onset of his reign.
Given the sort of man Buhari is, he needed a quintessential bureaucrat. But an SGF is not just a bureaucrat. He is the mediator and by-way between the ministries and MDGs on the one hand, and the political elite on the other.
So, while the SGF is a politician, he also bears a bureaucrat in his breast. He is therefore a binary man of government. He should laugh and dabble in the vainglory and thespian affinity of the agbada or babaringa in one moment. In the next moment, his brow should knot with figures and competencies and visions and roadmaps of projects, etc. In his full profile, he should swivel with almost animal reflex from one to another, as though he were born to speak with the politician and the permanent secretary in equal flourish of data and register.
We know the personage called Muhammadu Buhari. He is tall, gaunt, with a boyish smile that contrasts at times with an intimidating scowl. That scowl reminds me of that moment in his first world press conference as military head of state. “The press,” he roared, if we call it roar with the thin, firm, almost babyish muscularity of his voice. “We will tamper with that.” He probably will say “temper” today.
But that scowl comes rarely now. Maybe because he wears only civilian clothes, has been subjected to the mellowing of democratic ethos, has been subdued by the battering of age and the dew of time. In fact, because of the deliberateness of his actions, many believe he has lost a vital part of his principled fire. They say he is conscious of his peremptory past, and he is more wary of being cast in the mould of a despot.
Whatever the case is, Buhari still bears the carriage of the austere leader with deep pious reserve and disdain for material extravagance. His assets now in public glare reveal a man more in touch with the bounties of nature than of the bank.
So, his secretary to the government must compensate for his “lapses.” He must belong to what Max Weber, the authority on authority, calls “the legal rational” order. Buhari falls into the Weberian charismatic order. People of his class do not rely on position for power. He has what Harvard Professor Joseph Nye calls soft power. But it dwarfs the hard power of position. Weber sees it as the “authority of the extraordinary and personal gift of grace.” But of all the authorities, it is the most mysterious. Even Nye notes, in his The Powers to Lead, that nothing in itself guarantees a person charisma. Not voice, money, height, carriage, royalty, etc. Napoleon was smallish, Churchill burly, Lincoln tall and ugly, De Gaulle tall and handsome, Mandela tallish and handsome, Roosevelt tall on wheel chair.
Enter Babachir David Lawal. The new SGF is a politician but he has had his experience in industry. Big-boned with an effervescent spirit, his first stark contrast with Buhari is that he is a pastor in the North from a minority tribe known as Tilba. But he worked in the Niger Delta for a few years where he can spin yarns about the men in that region and their habits of fashion and work. He worked with the Delta Steel Company in Aladja in today’s Delta State, after graduating in engineering from the Ahmadu Bello University.
He also worked with Data Science Limited and NITEL. He has traversed the private and public trusts, and he broke out to be an entrepreneur with his own firm, and has been a member of the engineering and computer elites in the country. That is the bureaucrat.
As a politician, he worked in the Northeast and rose to be the All Progressives Congress vice chairman in the region. But the intriguing thing was his role during the Boko Haram high noon of infamy. He was a pioneer in rallying the hunters to fight the bands of militants. The story of how these hunters mounted counteroffensives against the militants will one day be told. He rallied them with dane guns, bows and arrows. We recall some of their efforts. In one of those battles, the hunters beat the BH boys where our armies failed.
Lawal was also, as a politician, a victim of his support for Buhari, when robbers attacked him and claimed it was because of his support for Buhari in 2011. The irony was that he was alone in his choice as a Buhari supporter when others looked Jonathan’s way. Some hoodlums attacked his church, The ECWA Gospel Church, and burned down the building. They left a bold picture of Buhari as emblem of their rage. Lawal’s fellow church members accused him of collaborating with the arsonists.
There we go. We have seen how he can be both politician and administrator. The job of SGF is not equals part bureaucratic and political. I daresay it is more political. But it’s bureaucratic component looms. It determines whether the government can succeed or not. For a charismatic character like Buhari, he leads because he is a leader. But for Lawal, it is the rules, not ruler, who is important. That’s why his job is tricky. Part of his job is to forestall the sort of nightmare that novelist Franz Kafka painted about bureaucracy in his book, The Castle, where a visitor cannot find the chief bureaucrat even after entering the castle.
Some modern theorists of administration, who speak of transactional and transformational leadership latch a good leader to all virtues and categories. He must have a dose of each. Weber identified a third leadership type: the traditional. In Nigeria, it refers to patriarchs and feudalist leaders like kings and emirs. Some have said the evolution of the Catholic Church exemplifies the three types: Jesus (Charismatic), Priests (traditional) the church itself (legal rational).
The same sort of chemistry is required to work in states. A blend is important between governor and SSG. We are seeing that in Lagos, for instance. The secretary is the lingua franca between politics and the bureaucracy. When the connection fails between president and SGF, a great adjustment is necessary.
Powerful bureaucrats change the course of history. We know of Simeon Adebo and Jerome Udoji. Sometimes politicians do it well. A great example was Obafemi Awolowo, who blended the bureaucrat and the politician, although one got in the way of the other at times. In Kenya, journalist-turned-bureaucrat John Githongo was a great anti-corruption warrior. India has a long list of them but Krishnan Menon is unforgettable for his many work. In the United States, a soldier George Marshall helped rebuild post-war Europe with the Marshall Plan. French man Jean Monet helped turn a steel industry as the germ for building the European Union.
It all depends on how well Buhari will put Lawal to work, and how much visionary and strategic vitality Lawal will bring to the table. We now have the SGF. Hopefully, in a few weeks, we shall have the ministers and the Buhari engine should start to whir.
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A politician with the interest of his people
When he indicated interest to vie for an elective office to represent his people of Verre constituency in the Adamawa State House of Assembly in the just concluded elections, Abdullahi Umar did not bother to vie under the platform of the ruling party.
He sought for it under the All Progressives Congress (APC). I believe he would make a difference in the representation for good governance through the initiation of bills that will move the constituency forward. The Verre constituency is lacking almost in every ramification.
His campaign promises were essentially hinged on delivering the basic dividend of democracy and to make laws for good governance. He was elected based on his well-articulated programmes that would ultimately remove the constituency from the shackles of want and deprivation.
His main concern that prompted him to venture into the arts of politics was the way that his constituency has not fared well since the enthronement of the present political dispensation in 1999. In the final analysis, I believe the people of Verre have not made a wrong choice with the election of Umar. Within the next four years, he will uplift the constituency to an appreciable level.
By Usman Santuraki,
Jimeta_Yola.
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Judge or politician?
The sheer oddity of it all made it go viral: a sitting judge calling for the impeachment of a sitting governor! This was one example of new media giving an old media principle a fillip.
Move over, the classic news oddity of a man biting a dog. Take a bow, the neo-classic oddity of a serving jurist calling for a governor’s sack! And extant journalism teachers, take note.
Justice Oloyede Folahanmi, reportedly a serving judge in the State of Osun, just did a 30-page petition, reportedly to the Osun House of Assembly, calling for the impeachment of Governor Rauf Aregbesola and his Deputy, Grace Laoye-Tomori, in accordance with sections 128 and 129 of the 1999 Constitution.
Justice Folahanmi also reportedly copied the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime, Amnesty International (AI), Transparency International (TI) and reportedly “others”, calling for the investigation of those he claimed were responsible for the “deliberate mismanagement of the economy of Osun State.”
Now, is Mrs Folahanmi a judge or a politician?
First, is the oddity of a judge on a state Bench turning activist to politically terminate the tenure of an elected governor — probably unprecedented in Nigerian history, as troubled as it is. Besides, this jars against the culture of professional reticence, which is the hallmark of the judiciary; not to talk of the rigid separation of power doctrine, the rigour of checks-and-balances, on which the presidential system is anchored.
Then, the list of the agencies the judge copied in her petition. EFCC — understandable, for its forte is investigating sleaze in the public space. But UN, AI and TI? Do Their Lordships too, by training, inclination and professional conduct, play to the gallery, no matter how just their cause? Besides, how does the judge measure as a disturbing portrait of the Judiciary as meddlesome interloper, as her core constituency would, without hesitation, say?
Hardball would really like to read Justice Folahanmi’s petition, because the reportage of the quotes from it is a bit fuzzy and confusing. Samplers:
“I declare that in addition to the media-hype [media-hype: if so, why are people being owed salary for months?], I have firsthand experience which constitutes evidence of the unfortunate situation in which Osun currently finds herself [so, experience which is aggregated opinion, now qualifies as hard evidence?]
“Neglecting the welfare of members of the community under the guise of wanting to provide infrastructure, run contrary to the teaching of Christ, the son of God, Jesus of Nazareth …” Now what is this — Law, politics or theology?
“Mr. Governor and his deputy are assiduously working against it [ideals of social order], as exemplified by the cruel, and harsh debasement of pensioners and civil servants by DELIBERATELY and MALICIOUSLY (capitalisation Hardball’s) withholding their salaries for months, in an attempt to browbeat, subjugate to take away their God-given free will, and reduce them to mindless robots …”
Really — and does His Lordship have concrete evidence for these assertions? Besides, is this a judge speaking with forensic evidence or some market folk just mouthing wild allegations?
And the clincher: “Their action … is as illegal as it is immoral and unconscionable … There is therefore no legal or moral basis for their continued stay in office. “ Now, what is the judge’s forte: morality or legality?
Well, the appropriate authorities should probe Mrs Folahanmi’s allegations. But so should the National Judicial Commission (NJC), the judge’s disgraceful conduct of exposing the Osun Judiciary to politics and possible odium.
All lovers of democratic institution-building should decry Mrs Folahanmi’s reckless intervention. If NJC does not post-haste call her to order, the Osun Judiciary would soon be swamped in politics — of the most reckless hue. That would be well and truly tragic.
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Punish parents who compromise education, says politician
Lagos State Progressive People’s Alliance (PPA) chieftain, Mrs Pauline Adegbe, has urged parents to desist from engaging their children in trading during school hours.
Addressing reporters in Lagos, she said a situation where children who are supposed to be in school loiter around motor parks, highways and other places, hawking not only exposes them to criminal activities but the risk of being killed.
Mrs Adegbe said: “Parents who use their children as means of earning a living should stop doing so. That is not the purpose of God who gave them to us. As parents, it is our responsibility to cater for them.
“This is one area I want to call on the Lagos State government to look into. There should be stringent laws to punish parents who try to compromise the education of their children by preferring to allow them to hawk instead of being in school.”
The PPA chieftain urged Lagos State government to increase its financial budget for education, noting that it will lessen the burden of parents who are not able to cater for their wards’ education.
“With government increased budgetary allocation to education, it will be affordable by parents with minimal effort to send their children to school. School enrollment will increase, this will benefit the state and the entire country in the long run.
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Re: Osoba: The veteran politician at bay
Or Olatunji Dare’s piece, Osoba: The veteran politician at bay, published in the back-page of the Nation on May 12, was an elegant public relations stunt. Any reader without the knowledge of the politics of Ogun State in recent years will come to the conclusion that Chief Olusegun Osoba was shortchanged by the current governor of Ogun State, Senator Ibikunle Amosun.
From the very choice of the title, the writer meticulously crafted the piece to arouse public sympathy for Osoba and adroitly cast Amosun in bad light. Dr Dare clearly scored an offside goal, which must be disallowed.
Wrote the columnist, “Hounded ceaselessly by Gbenga Daniel who never saw an opponent he did not want to destroy, Osoba went into political hibernation in Lagos, where he busied himself rebuilding the Ogun State ACN and positioning it to return to power in 2007 with Ibikunle Amosun, a former PDP Senator, as Governor… Then, things began to go sour. Osoba could not get his nominees appointed to the state’s cabinet or given senior positions in the Amosun administration, I gather. Though chair of the ACN in Ogun State, his influence was at best slight. He found himself being pushed closer and closer to the margins.”
Dr Dare will not be the first to slant the mutually-beneficial relationship between Osoba’s ACN and a new entrant from the ANPP, Ibikunle Amosun, which culminated in the latter’s victory at the governorship election in 2011. But the public deserves to know the whole truth.
Movement of politicians from one party to another is not new in Nigeria; and until we overcome the problem of lack of internal democracy and ensure electoral justice at all times through a level-playing ground for all members of a political party, such will continue.
Amosun was a distinguished Senator of the Federal Republic from 2003 to 2007 on the platform of PDP. In that 2003 Ogun Central senatorial election, Chief Osoba, then incumbent governor and leader of AD, lost his polling booth, ward and local council to Amosun, a grassroots politician par excellence. If one may add in parenthesis, it is not surprising that the same fate befell Osoba’s SDP in the recently-concluded general elections. It lost at all levels to Amosun’s APC.
In 2007, Amosun contested the governorship election in Ogun on the platform of ANPP. The AD, under the leadership of Chief Osoba, fielded Chief Dipo Dina (of blessed memory) as its candidate. At the close of the poll, the incumbent governor, Gbenga Daniel of the PDP, was declared winner. Amosun was second while Osoba’s AD came third. An enraged Amosun contested the results because he believed he won the election. And the general feeling in Ogun up till today is that Amosun won the 2007 election but his victory was upturned from ‘above’.
The public was fed up with the PDP anyway, but how do you dislodge them from power in the state when the incumbent governor, Gbenga Daniel, was poised to install a successor at all cost? By 2010, ANPP had suffered some setbacks nationally. Amosun, consumed with passion to restore the glory of Ogun State and make it 21st century compliant, then decided to pitch his tent with ACN. He was welcomed. But why was he given the governorship slot when ACN already had candidates jostling for the post? Simple. Amosun, based on his performance in 2007 and his public profile as a grassroots politician, stood a better chance to deliver victory for ACN. In other word, Amosun came with immense electoral value and goodwill while ACN had better platform in comparison to ANPP. So, it was a win-win situation for both Amosun and Osoba.
There were other intrigues that played out, especially on the choice of candidates for the Ogun State House of Assembly and National Assembly. Amosun, not being a rookie in politics, would not commit political hara-kiri by meeting all the expectations and demands of Osoba or walk into a political trap that would have turned him into a figure-head governor who could be impeached on flimsy grounds in order to satisfy the whims and caprices of a godfather. In such circumstances, the extraordinary achievements witnessed today in Ogun would have been impossible.
Contrary to the impression created in the said piece, half of the politicians in the cabinet of Ogun State are from Osoba’s camp. Indeed, there are many loyalists of Osoba, including his direct nominees, holding senior positions in the government and totally dominating at the party level of the ruling APC in Ogun State. Could Amosun, who is an exemplar of prudence in public finance management in Nigeria, have bought all of them over? Certainly, no. Why then are they following him? It is because they believe in his Mission to Rebuild Ogun State. And the outstanding results are there all across the state for everyone to see.
The governor is a thoroughbred Yoruba who will not attack or abuse his elders. And it is to his credit that despite the acerbic attacks and abuses directed at him from the Osoba camp, no one can accuse Amosun of ever insulting Chief Osoba.
According to Dr Dare, “The day Osoba returned to Ogun State and his home in Abeokuta has got to be one of the most glorious in his eventful life. He was met at the Lagos-Ogun boundary by a cavalcade of jubilant party men and women, admirers, and supporters, and escorted to the state capital and his home with song and dance. Rarely had the ancient city witnessed such a carnival.”
Could it be possible that the writer knew about this “Osoba’s triumphant entry” but was not aware that Amosun was at the vanguard of that memorable home-coming arrangement for Osoba?
Disagreement is a human phenomenon. Even at the best of time, husband and wife disagree let alone participants in a political marriage. While Amosun was still expressing the hope that the misunderstanding would be resolved as one family, just like Dr Olatunji Dare said he attempted to do, Chief Osoba closed the door against reconciliation in the following words at his residence in Ibara, Abeokuta in May, 2014:
“Where we are now, no room for harmonization or reconciliation… not even 70/30; 80/20; 95/5… I vowed to them that I will not forgive or reconcile with anybody…As I stand before you today, I swear before God and Jesus Christ, my Lord, I promised you all that the issue of forgiveness is no more… They said they have set up elders’ committee, don’t mind them. I don’t know who is older than me politically among them. None of them is closer to Awolowo than I was. I wined and dined with him… They are coming very soon, when they come, they would not meet me… Leave them, we are moving to the Promised Land and over there, there are many offices and positions available…”
Not a few argued that no astute politician could have uttered such words. Indeed, I know not a few loyalists or fans of Osoba both within and outside Ogun that recoiled and turned back on account of his near blasphemous words.
Ordinarily, Amosun is now in a position to gloat over his victory against Osoba after such a titanic battle. But he is not a triumphalist. He believes power comes from God. Besides, he has no personal axe to grind with Osoba. It is a question of political differences. Amosun will continue to treat Osoba with utmost respect and will be the first to seize by the forelock any opportunity for political reconciliation.
- Adeyemi served as Senior Special Assistant on Communications to the governor of Ogun State.