R-L: Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State, Senator Babafemi Ojudu and Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, leaving the venue of the eight-day prayer for Alhaja Saratu, the mother of Osun State Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, by helicopter in Ilesa

By Ademola Adegbamigbe

Look at these three men in this photograph. They are sons of Ekiti. Picture, as the saying goes, speaks louder than a thousand words. Left is the Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dr. Kayode Fayemi. In the middle is Senator Babafemi Ojudu, Special Adviser in the Presidency. On the right is the Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose.

They are in their best diplomatic or political behaviour here. No skud missile is fired from one camp to the other and none is being intercepted mid-air. It was Vice President Yemi Osinbajo who made the three men ride in the same helicopter on Tuesday 8 August 2017 when they were leaving the venue of the eight-day prayer for Alhaja Saratu, the mother of the State of Osun Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, in Ilesa.

In symbolic terms though, Ekiti governorship election is inching closer. It comes up on 14 July 2018. Fayemi and Ojudu are aspirants on the platform of All Progressives Congress (APC) and the two men have begun their vigorous campaigns with their loyalists throwing vitriol at each other. It is a war by proxy – but war all the same. Put differently, the two men are in the political arena, gladiators going for the kill! On the other tip of the triangle is Fayose of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), who wants to make sure that he plants his own minion in office when his tenure expires later this year.

In this photograph, Fayemi bows his head, his pair of glasses balanced on the bridge of his nose in a professorial fashion. It is a body language that seems to say, “I am not talking to you, Femi”. Fayemi seems to be either scrolling his ipad or simply minding his own business. It is the posture of a cool, deep, calculating politician telling all who care to listed that you “underrate me at your own peril”.

Then there is Ojudu, OJ for style in the newsroom, looking ahead, his gaze fixed at a landscape visible to him alone. If you know the man, his face looks jovial like this when making some sense out of nonsense. His lips spread in a semi smile nature when he is about to create humour out of a situation or about to crack a joke that would make you bend double with laughter. Or it is the posture of a man who can boast that he is a veteran of many wars and survivor of many skirmishes. “I will show both of you in Ekiti. I fought IBB and Abacha. I will finish the two of you with no more effort than stepping on maggots,” he seems to be saying.

See Fayose who dons the expressionlessness of a Sphynx. What could be going on in his mind? Perhaps: “Were it not for Osinbajo who stuffed me in this contraption here with you two, what is my business with you? Nonsense! I am just waiting for the two of you to fight and cancel each other out. Then I will spring a surprise on everybody. It is then your eyes will be clear!”

Have you wondered why Fayose is not talking as Ojudu and Fayemi mount their campaign even as their supporters haul obscenities on social media at each other’s camps? The man, as political analysts posit, is planning something.

The lesson here is that APC, as political analysts are saying, should maintain peace in its own camp as any house divided against itself ( as the Holy Book says) cannot stand. Fayose who is waiting like a patient vulture, is busy calculating.

Ekiti has a larger picture. The three men are sons of the soil. They have no other states they can call theirs. They should behave well and “salvage it together”.