This is why I’m flabbergasted that President Jonathan is allowing some rascals to mislead and drive him down that same evil alley. A man who was rescued and raised up by God should never play God.
Fellow
Nigerians, please I have no intention of scaring anyone today but to paint a
realistic scenario of what may likely happen soon. Experience has taught me not
to dismiss anything as mere rumour these days. I vividly recollect the damage
even unfounded rumour can cause in a country so prone to malicious gossips as
Nigeria.
Permit me to take you down memory lane especially those who were yet to be
born, or old enough to experience first-hand certain events, in1989 that
culminated in what was dubbed the SAP Riots. It so happened that an evil genius
somewhere had released a bazooka of a rumour about General Ibrahim Badamasi
Babangida and his family. The tale-bearer had mentioned that there was a story
in Ebony, an American magazine, which purportedly listed the stupendous wealth
of the Babangidas, including coded accounts in Switzerland, a sprawling
boutique in Paris, choice properties in a few world capitals and so on.
The rumour ignited like bush-fire in harmattan just as some livid and obviously
rabid Nigerians went wild and took to the streets. I don’t remember the exact
date of this conflagration but it was on a particular Wednesday in May 1989. I
was a reporter working for the Weekend Concord at the time and was out of Lagos
when the demonstrators unleashed mayhem in different parts of Nigeria, most
especially in Lagos and Benin City. I had returned on a Friday to my desk while
the first edition of our wave-making and audacious newspaper had already gone
out. And the cover read: Black Wednesday in Lagos.
I immediately approached my Editor, Mr Mike Awoyinfa, a man with an uncanny
nose for news and scoops, and challenged him about the lack of adequate bite in
the reportage of that important story. My Editor threw the challenge back at me
and instructed me to write another version for the second edition. The story I
was about to pen was so dangerously precarious under a military regime but I
challenged fate and broke down the eventful riots into pieces and took the
readers back into its original source. Every newspaper had celebrated the story
but they were just too timid to situate the reasons for the total breakdown of
law and order apparently for fear of a backlash from the petulant military
rulers.
What I found preposterous was the fact that no one had made sufficient effort
to look for the original publication that supposedly printed the satanic story.
Even the famous social crusader, Dr Tai Solarin, who led a chunky part of the
rebellion, said he had not seen an original copy of the magazine. Everything
was thus based on rumours upon rumours and hearsay upon hearsay. Fortunately
for me, as I sat down to write one of my most difficult stories ever, our
Managing Director, Dr Doyinsola Hamidat Abiola, received some current editions
of Ebony magazine from our Chairman, Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola,
who had just flown in from one of his marathon trips abroad. Dr Abiola, as if
in spirit, had urgently dispatched the copies of Ebony to my Editor who in turn
sent them to me, and that confirmed our worst fears that there was no such
story and it was all a mere fabrication to smear the government.
I must have written one of my best stories ever that night. I traced the origin
of the rumours and painted a vivid picture of the allegations. I mentioned
authoritatively that we had combed several issues of Ebony and there was no
such story ever published. For extra effect, we made a bromide of the latest Ebony
cover and plastered it on the cover of Weekend Concord. As I sweated over the
story, I uncharacteristically sent for a bottle of beer to calm down my nerves.
The Publisher of Classique magazine, May Ellen Ezekiel, had walked in to submit
her MEE column which I had the privilege of editing, and asked why I was
looking so tense. I told her about my delicate story and she was wowed by my
bravery. That very night, she started working on how to poach me to her
magazine. What was more, our Lagos edition of Weekend Concord sold 80,000
copies that Saturday.
My mind raced back to this experience about four weeks ago as I ran into a
Nigerian lady in Madrid who told me she had left Nigeria in order to escape
election violence but was returning because it was postponed. As I write this,
I know of many families running away from Nigeria between now and next week. If
you doubt the veracity of my gist, please call or try to book flights on any of
the major airlines and tell me your experience later. Election has become a war
and a matter of life and death in our country. I was hoping things would be
different after watching the peace accord document that was voluntarily signed
by our political gladiators in Abuja, before man and God. I was
particularly encouraged by the loud banter exchanged between President Jonathan
and Major General Muhammadu Buhari. It is tragic that the accord broke down
almost as soon as it was signed.
I won’t make you more miserable by regurgitating some of the nonsense
campaigning we’ve been subjected to by adults and supposed nationalists who
should know much better and act decorously. But the situation has so
degenerated that no one can predict what would happen next. Now the
scaremongering has reached a crescendo. The biggest rumour in town is that the
ruling party has decided that it will never hand over power to the opposition
no matter the outcome of the election. And these rumours are emanating from
some of those very close to the corridors of power. The First Lady, in
particular, has not hidden her disdain for her husband’s main challenger. I’ve
taken time to watch most of her campaigns after my well-circulated open letter
to her hoping to see a mellowing down in tone and tempo but she seems to have
charged back with a vengeance thus spiralling out of control. The hate speeches
have shone clearly that our nation is on tenterhooks and we need loads of
prayers to have this cup pass over us.
The doomsday predilection should therefore be taken seriously since nothing can
be ruled out in our dear beloved country. The power-mongers are never tired of
trying new stunts. Who would have believed in 1993 that Chief Abiola would win
the election and a few people would sit in a room and cancel what had the
potential of unifying Nigerians forever! But it happened before our very eyes.
Unfortunately, Nigeria has known no peace since then. We have become more
divided and stupidly disunited since then.
The actors and characters currently in power seem to want to try their own June
12 fiasco. They have been going round taking lessons and tutorials in how to
hold a whole country to ransom and by the jugular just because they must hang
on to power. They do not mind wielding guns and cudgels in broad daylight on
the streets of a megacity, with security agents in tow. They have reduced the
issues of performance and under-performance to ethnicity and religion. I
thought it should be obvious that elections are not won by force but through
deliverables and persuasion. Rather than encourage Professor Attahiru Jega to do
a better job this time, I’ve watched all manner of hirelings on television
cooking some hocus-pocus in order to discredit the man and hopefully boot him
out. Someone high up even assured me Jega will be removed by today because he
would never be permitted to conduct the forthcoming election and it just didn’t
make sense to me.
If I was going to dismiss the Interim Government rumour out of hand I was
immediately jolted back to reality after the latest warning by no less
personages than Professor Wole Soyinka and Lt. General Alani Ipoola Akinrinade
both of whom have access to very solid and credible intelligence. General
Olusegun Obasanjo had also spoken copiously against it and must have had good
cause for doing so. In case some of the present warriors have lost their memory
of the June 12 crisis, let me remind them about what happened to each of the
dramatis personae one by one.
General Babangida was the President who supervised that election which
Professor Humphrey Nwosu conducted efficiently. After the annulment,
Babangida, who went by the moniker Maradona, was forced to step aside and he
never succeeded in coming back as he seemed to have planned and designed. He
lost to boot what would have being his most glorious moment. Chief Ernest
Degunle Shonekan was forced on the nation as Head of Interim Government but he
hardly settled in before some soldiers put guns to his head and forced him to
relinquish power in a jiffy. Chief Moshood Abiola was deceived into believing
that General Sani Abacha would hand over to him after a coup that would flush
out the Babangida renegades but it turned out to be a grand scam. Abacha took
power and decided to sit pretty and the owner of the mandate was left out in
the chilly cold.
Abacha wasted no time in arresting Chief Abiola and kept him for most part
incommunicado and in solitary confinement. Abacha must also researched those
likely to have voluble ambition to checkmate him and he discovered two
influential Generals, Olusegun Obasanjo and Shehu Musa Yar’Adua and promptly
hurled both into detention after arranging some felonious charges against them.
The latter died in prison. Both Abacha and Abiola would later die in mysterious
circumstances, just one month apart in 1998. Nigeria itself went into a coma.
Over two decades after, we are still grappling with lack of basic necessities
of life and we’ve never had things so bad minus the civil war era which some of
our brethren in the East also appear to have forgotten by playing race card
above potentials.
The danger of plotting against your people is you never know the punishment
that awaits you and yours. I’m sure many of those who brought crisis upon us
these past decades must be gnashing their teeth by now. Had they concocted a
better Nigeria, things would probably have turned out differently today even
for them. Our country would have been rescued from the vermin now plaguing our
land. Only God gives power and HE is the one who can take it back.
I will give my last example. In 2010, everything was done by the so-called cabal
to stop the then Vice President, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, from assuming power. The
custodian of the power himself was too sick and totally oblivious to the
power-game around him. Yet a few people commandeered Nigeria in his name. At
the height of the higgledy-piggledy it was even suggested that power was going
to be transferred to his wife. We were all afraid that Nigeria may collapse in
the process but nothing of the sort happened because God the ALMIGHTY, as
always, sorted Nigeria out. Without anyone firing a bullet those playing God
ate the humble pie and left power without as much as a whimper.
This is why I’m flabbergasted that President Jonathan is allowing some rascals
to mislead and drive him down that same evil alley. A man who was rescued and
raised up by God should never play God. There is nothing more to gain by our
President. He is the luckiest man I know, dead or alive. What more can he ever
ask for? My advice as usual is simple and straight-forward.
Mr President has one week to make history and the only way to achieve that is
not to end his career in unproductive acrimony. All those prodding him on,
including his wife, have nothing to lose but he has everything to forfeit. I’m
sure most of those who worked for the world’s most notorious dictators are
still around to enjoy their loot while the despots have all been consigned to
the dustbin of history. That is the tragedy that befalls those who listen to
similarly wrong people that litter our political landscape and I see so many
more of them along the corridors of Abuja.
There is a thin line between success and failure. What Nigeria needs is a
visibly free and credible election. We need it now more than ever. If the
President wins, so be it. And if the opposition candidate creates an upset, I
expect the President to ring him up and concede defeat like other digital
leaders such as him. The world shall rise up and give him a standing ovation.
But if he plays for broke by deciding to fight dirty as pre-ordained by the
hawks that appear to have enchanted and engulfed him, the rest of us shall take
solace in the Lord’s Prayer:
“Our Father, who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy Name
Thy will be done on earth,
As it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive them who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
The power, and the glory,
For ever and ever.
Amen.”
PENDULUM BY DELE MOMODU, Email: dele.momodu@thisdaylive.com
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