Ms Omoh Giwa

By Omoh Giwa

Dear Chief Moshood Abiola,

I, like Bob Marley, seem to have been Waiting in vain for a reply to my previous missive though I am willing to acknowledge that I might have grieved you. I do not know which part of that communiqué incensed you. Could it be my linking your legacy to Fela’s ITT song or my allusion to your sexual perfidy? I don’t think these facts warrant this disdain and snobbery to my call for action except if you consider my accusation of your dining and wining with many devils (then you should be furious).

Like your ‘abiku’ name tag, your brothers have been playing the waiting game with hopes (built on clouds) that they will emerge victorious. My previous correspondence had me rambling about elections and electoral violence in Nigeria. If I may remind you, a paragraph of that letter states : I often wonder why people say your mandate was stolen… a mandate was stolen because we view political service and government contracts as taking your share of the national cake. Why else would someone build his mandate on ‘It is my turn’ ideology? His turn to do what? Loot the country drier? Use his position to reward his comrades?

This political philanthropist stated publicly that emi lokan to be president and was handed his party’s flag based on that notion and you dare to deny that Aso Rock is not a property to be inherited? Like a child throwing at tantrum, he was handed the flag (was he really handed? I’m not sure with all that trembling). He was on the right track when he screamed with frustration (if only you had the foresight to take this approach) in demanding his birthright (he owns several businesses and states. It is within his right to claim what he has worked for since his days of attacking military dictator, Abacha who refused him power) yet I am disappointed at the supposed intellectuals cheering such petulant recalcitrant behaviour.

Do you remember I asked you to anticipate the drama (I think I shall make huge bucks from this prophesying profession should this path not pan-out) that is set to unfold with the 2023 elections and I would love to state that this just might be the tip of the iceberg. That which is capable of sinking the Titanic, is about to hit us and like those aboard the fateful vessel, we are carefree, celebrating and rewarding that which shall be our downfall.

Let us discuss the duplicitous nature of our politicians especially those of Southern descent and their continued alliance with the North (now some naysayers might ask why we didn’t say this when Bourdillon aligned with Jonathan but ask yourself if it was in the interest of the Yoruba race or for his personal political ambition). We have refused to study our past and like the man who refused to recall where the rain began to beat us; we might never remember where to dry our bodies.

 

Do you remember I asked you to anticipate the drama (I think I shall make huge bucks from this prophesying profession should this path not pan-out) that is set to unfold with the 2023 elections and I would love to state that this just might be the tip of the iceberg. That which is capable of sinking the Titanic, is about to hit us and like those aboard the fateful vessel, we are carefree, celebrating and rewarding that which shall be our downfall.

We seem to forget quickly, the end of certain liaisons with our comrades up North and the doom that follows it for us down South. Consider Awolowo’s duplicitous role before the civil war and his fiscal policy during the civil war yet was denied presidency by the North. Or need I mention your role in the emergence of a certain military officer and his annulment of your victory or your other friend who wrecked your businesses, assassinated your wife, imprisoned you which led to your untimely demise? Do not get me started on the games during the first republic where strange bedfellows laid on bugs-infested beds for a shot at power. Should we discuss how you used National Concord to undermine Awo so as to gain favour before your imperial Northern Nigeria? I will not mention the 2013 unholy alliance that produced the worst political and economic mistake to ever reside in The House on a Hill. I laugh at those who call this duplicity, The Yoruba Political Sophistication as though it shows their superior intellectual capacity. Superiority that did not favour Zik or Awo (not even you in your religious bond and similarity). Why are hoping it would work now? Imagine if this duplicitous character had paved the way for a Yoruba nationalist but it never works yet you insist on descending this slippery slope? What has dining and wining with the North given Professor Pastor? Third place yet he sacrificed his ‘legacy’ (disputable as what we know as his legacy was handed to him by his benefactor, The Emi lokan of Nigeria). In a bid to please his principal, he sacrificed his career on the altar of continuing a legacy that has brought nothing but poverty and hardship to the average Nigerian.

ASUU strike which began with a warning action has been on for over three months yet neither the president nor presidential candidates are clamouring for the return of students back to the classroom. Those who even mention the strike do so in a bid to campaign their ambition and promise to return students and lecturers back to the classrooms when they win (are we to wait till May 2023?) If I received a dollar every time I read about the collapse of the national grid, I would become a foreign exchange dealer at Yaba. Do not get me started about the insecurity in the Southwest (home to the deal-wranglers and political sophistication). Imagine the police receiving a letter that threatens religious freedom in Nigeria and making copies of that letter to those threatened advising them to be security-conscious and then what? What should they do with their new found ability of detecting criminals and terrorist? Here is what they hoped to achieve with their falsely masked tactic; incite fear and decline of attendance in congregants else why would the police not swing into action and do their jobs like other civil/public servants.

Despite the instances in our history of the treachery of politrickians, Southern clownery continues, impoverishing us to the magnitude found in the north. They often tag themselves nationalists yet their personal ambition and gain drives them, not the welfare of the collective. The Yorubas have a saying that a traditional rainmaker who invokes a storm on his people cannot prevent his house from destruction.

Enjoy your fitful rest.

Giwa writes from the University of Lagos.