Columns
Peter Obi: Now is the time! Nobody can stop a moving train
The late Owelle of Onitsha, Nnamdi Azikiwe, had so many things to say to Nigeria and Nigerians, before he finally exited the space after so many years of leadership roles. Many of them were admonitions on how to handle difficult situations. He once cautioned that only a fool confronts a man with a gun. In other words, no one must not do so. In times of despair, he advised adherence to doing good and being on the right side of posterity, saying history shall vindicate the just and God shall punish the wicked and confine them to the scrap-heap of unforgotten tyrants.
Yet, it was also the same Zik that reminded Nigerians that no condition is permanent, referring them to the message on the tailboard of the rickety truck struggling to climb the Milliken Hill, Enugu. For those who have been following history, not one word of the admonitions of that Nigerian sage, has been wasted. None has gone without being fulfilled before the eyes of the very Nigerians he spoke to either in his writings on speeches.
It takes those with the sense of history to follow through and juxtapose what has been happening in Nigeria with the declarations, admonitions and messages of Zik and see how much sense they can make from them and use it to either comfort themselves or move forward. For as it is said, those who fail to learn from history, keep repeating them.
Now, permit me to tell a little story. It’s about Nwakpuda, the passionate Umuahia village warrior. I’ll abridge it, because it’s a long story. The British colonial masters, in a bid to develop part of then East, had carved out a rail line that passed through his village to Port Harcourt. But, Nwakpuda, was so passionate that he swore that no train would pass through his father’s land. So, on the day the train was to be test-run, he had heard from the town-criers of the event and the brave warrior he was, he decided to enforce his vow and got ready. Apparently without further revelation of his plans, lest he be impeded, he sharpened his war cutlass and off he went to the rail track. The train driver saw him from afar as he stood with his cutlass at the ready and continued to blast his horn. But Nwakpuda laughed at the approaching “animal,” quipping derisively – I’ve not even touched you and you’re crying – stood firmly and ready to smash it with his weapon. Of course, the inevitable happened. He was crushed on the rail track.
But you know what? The white man didn’t allow it to go. Such heroism they thought! So, in the place where Nwakpuda died, they built an epitaph in his recognition. So, Nwakpuda, didn’t die in vain. He was a hero and a legend. That’s the end of the story.
Why did I recall this? Some people in Nigeria today, are playing such a heroic replication of Nwakpuda, the Umuahia legend in trying to stop a moving train with bare hands. Else, how do you situate the huffing and puffing by some political tendencies in the land over the ambition of Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) outside what the diminutive – yes, they said he was very short, but powerful – Nwakpuda, tried to do?
I wasn’t there in the first republic. So, I might not situate it correctly to say there has never been anything like it. But I could say so from the second republic that nobody, has ever conduced such a pan-Nigerian movement as the Peter Obi movement has been able to create. Else, if you knew any other Nigerian politician, who has created a similar momentum where followers, across the country, gladly contribute money to print posters, make T-shirts and hold street rallies, let the world know.
All the purveyors of this paradigm shift, he seems to beget, appear to have one message – ENOUGH! Nigeria will no longer be run by vested interests, whose only motive is to pocket the commonwealth, from whence they dish out privileges, like Robin Hood, who stole from the rich and gave to the poor, or closer, back home, the legendary Lawrence Anini, the great armed robber, who after killing and robbing his victims, threw parts of his loot to commoners in the market for them to scramble for and thereby, creating a hero image of himself.
Yes! The resonating message through Obi is quite apparent – Don’t steal on our behalf again. Let us take our destiny in our hands. Let us build a new order. That is their battle-cry. Yet, there are naysayers, swearing that this won’t happen. The train would not pass through their father’s land, they insist. Their weapons, like Nwakpuda’s sharpened cutlass, come in different forms.
You hear that about 5,000 youths were quartered at a luxurious hotel in Abuja for a special training on the use of social media to do battle – the target – Peter Obi. They want to cut him down in the same way Nwakpuda, wanted to slice the train to pieces with his cutlass. Only this time, unlike the Umuahia hero, who used salt to sharpen his cutlass overnight, the weapons are said to have been sharpened with raw cash – some say N500,000 monthly pay. don’t even try to calculate what it amounts to. It’s chicken feed to the patrons who have procurred them. After all N2.5billion monthly revenue from a state Internally Generated Revenue (IGR), is not moi-moi. And that’s just one aspect.
So, you see all manner of ugly narratives and campaigns of calumny in the social media. It doesn’t matter how infantile or obtuse – they don’t need to be factual or make sense – just write anything and get paid. So, they go to work. Completely for the pay. It doesn’t matter what happens thereafter as long as the pay keeps coming. Ironically, the same people even those that associate him with the damning imagery – Obituary, turn around to harass for the same offence, even when, like the biblical lamb going to the slaughterhouse, he replies not as much as whimper.
If Obi sneezes, it would be fact-checked to test the quality or decibel of the sound. He farts like any other human being, they’ll ask google how pungent the smell is. Someone speaks for hours, reeling out tens and scores of figures ad-lib and just one – they go to town with the singsong – he lies! As if lies have assumed a different meaning. Yet, it doesn’t matter that their patrons never even appear in public, let alone attempt what Obi does, even with prepared paper without disgracing themselves.
We all saw how far they could go in asking Edo people to vote out Godwin Obaseki and how Nigerians were asked to tweet on WhatsAPP and how 50million Nigerians recruited into the army would be fed with agbado, corns and cassava in the morning and yams in the evening. That’s what they want to compare.
Even heroes of the pen -professionals whose works had hitherto excited their audience, now fair no better. The have decided to lower their God-given talents and skills in their attempt to serve as Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) to the dis-ennobling project of keeping Nigerians permanently in Egypt. For such people, it doesn’t matter whatever happens to their brothers and sisters across the land and even beyond. It doesn’t matter whether Nigeria lives or dies as long as they repay the loans of loyalty which they believe they owe or pave the way for new inroads.
I’ve just finished reading Segun Ayobolu. A fantastic writer any day. Apparently soberer. But here he has fallen into the same meanspirited penchant to serve his master. I had thought that after Sam Omatseye, there would be lessons learnt. But no! It’s a project. So, he travels the same route – throwing his poisoned spear, not only at Peter Obi, but the Igbo – because, to him and his possible sponsors, outside the 2023 election, there will be no Nigeria again.
Taking off from where Sam stopped, he begins to trumpet and wrap Obi’s ambition into the straightjacket of the Igbo quest to produce the President of Nigeria. Like it is such an anathema. Now, what if it were so? Why not not if not? Like any other part of Nigeria, Ndigbo have not hidden their desire to that ambition. The argument has already been made that it needs no further stretching. Even Ayo Adebanjo, the President of Afenifere, the pan-Yoruba socio-cultural organisation, who ought to represent all the Yoruba people, is sold to that argument that the Igbo should be allowed to take the job. If by virtue of rotation, the governors of the All Progressives Congress (APC), decided to zone the position to the South, why not allow the South East to take the position? Simple argument! But, my colleague, Segun doesn’t see the merit – clinging to the convenient argument of democracy as in numbers, an argument he handily ignored when the Southern governors first pitched for the nation’s number one job and thereafter, South West politicians. If democracy as in numbers didn’t count then, it had to count when the Igbo make the same pitch. Well, because it’s politics, double-speak and hypocrisy is allowed.
But then, Obi even disowns that route. He tells anyone that cares to listen that he doesn’t want anyone to vote for him because he’s Igbo. He wants to be seen as a Nigerian President and not an Igbo President. Of course that is conveniently ignored. He must be cloaked with the ethnic garb.
Not satisfied, Ayobolu moves from there to bespatter him with the paintbrush of IPOB (Indigenous People of Biafra), which has become the most dangerous group in Nigeria more than Boko Haram, Islamic State of West African Province (ISWAP) and bandits put together. But he conveniently forgets to mention that there are also ethnic Yoruba groups, agitating self-government, such as O’odua Nation. He forgets that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu wears the same garb as Sunday Igboho. No, Obi’s ambition is fired by IPOB, while the ambition of his patron, Bola Ahmed Tinubu is a Nigerian project.
He conveniently forgets that the alter ego of Biafra, the main symbol of that effort, the late Ikemba Nnewi, Chief Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, actually ran for the same position Obi is seeking today, without as much as passive interest by Ndigbo, not to talk about Nigerians. But what do you say, when disinformation becomes the strategy? Keep shouting IPOB and sooner or later, the tag will stick. Unfortunately, very few seem to be listening.
Thus, the seeming exasperation and change of tactics. Go after Obi’s supporters – depict them as dangerous – hang anything negative on their necks and make Obi bear the consequences. How ingenious! Yet, Obi’s supporters are not on the ballot. Obi had even come out publicly to admonish his supporters to keep it clean and not insult anyone. But no! That’s not enough! He must pay the ultimate price of having his neck in the guillotine.
Come to think of it, what do you say of angry youths, whose father’s today was eaten yesterday, beholding their future being eaten today by vested interests? Shouldn’t they be sufficiently angry on their own and go against the culprit(s)? So, when members of the Pyrates Confraternity rendered their frustration in a song, what does the likes of Segun think fired their imagination? How could that be pinned on Obi?
Of course, it is convenient for Segun to travel the road of history and remind his audience about the ingredients of the first coup in the land, in his well-choreographed attempt to open old wounds, by informing his target – the North that it was an Igbo project. Of course, outside the fact that the people driving Obi’s project are beset by a far more fundamental existential threats right now to continue to dwell in the past, especially when the Northern region is virtually bearing the brunt of bad leadership over the decades, he failed to remind the same audience that the coup plotters, actually wanted to make the late Obafemi Awolowo, a Yoruba man the Prime Minister – at least, that was part of the narrative, attested to by some of the participants who are not Igbo.
Segun also failed to remind his audience that a Yoruba man, Adekunle Fajuyi, sacrificed his own life for an Igbo, Aguiyi Ironsi. He perhaps, conveniently forgets the millions of Ndigbo that have died as a result of the reprisal attacks and the civil war that followed. Obviously, that’s the path he wants to rekindle in the present generation, even when it appears that, that part of history, is fast receding from the memory of today’s Nigerians.
Just imagine Segun trying to pin the #EndSars protests on the Igbo. Haba! Something as fresh as yesterday! Despite the comments of Nnamdi Kanu, whose statement went into no issue and made as less impact as the incitement of Adeyinka Grandson for the Yoruba to kill all Igbo in Lagos, could Segun tell the world the identities of those eventually arrested for the acts of destruction? How many Igbo were found among those who invaded the palace of the Oba of Lagos, including those who stole his foreign currencies, swam in his pool and even wore his royal attires. How many?
Another point he laboured to make was to impute the oft-trumpeted line that Ndigbo got the meat during the government of Goodluck Jonathan, while the Yoruba were left with the skeleton. Well, the jury is out on that, my brother. The only thing that happened was that for the first time, it appeared that Ndigbo were given a pride of place in the affairs of the country as major stakeholders. That’s what the naysayers couldn’t bear to see.
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala did not come into government during Jonathan’s time. It was President Olusegun Obasajo that discovered her. Jonathan only continued where the former President stopped, even though with a bigger mandate, because the reward for good job is more work.
Under Obasanjo, an Igbo man was the Senate President – the third Nigerian citizen. But they lost that position under Jonathan. They never headed any arm of government till date. So, which special favour did the Igbo enjoy that Yoruba didn’t get? Even the Chief of Army Staff (COAS) position, which an Igbo man held then, was taken away when the din became so deafening and it appeared that the heavens would fall.
Please Segun, tell us how Mulikat Akande lost the position of Speaker of House of Representatives. Was it Jonathan or your patron that blocked it? I’m sure, now the entire South East, one of the legs of the Nigerian tripod has been stripped of everything, Segun would be happy. That’s the position he wants Ndigbo to maintain for there to be peace. That’s the only way they won’t be seen as troublemakers.
Yes, I’m one of those who lay claims to Lagos. I wish to be identified as a Lagos boy than Anambra, the same way a Yoruba from Ogbomoso or Iragbiji, ought to claim Coal City boy, if he were born in Enugu and grew up there. I couldn’t be happier watching Ademola Adeleke, the governor-elect of Osun State, speaking undiluted Igbo the other day. I want to see the day a Yoruba man would pick up the ticket of a political party and contest for governorship of Anambra State, where I come from, just like I know it would happen in Lagos, one day, as was the case when an Hausa became the first Mayor of Enugu. That may be years after my bones and those of Segun must have become dust. That’s the Nigerian I want to be. I say so, proudly. I don’t want to hear anyone telling me about Lagos giving me “privileges” or “accommodating” me. Sounds so archaic, primitive and unproductive.
In fact it is new in the Lagos I know. Yes, as a student of Awori College Ojo, I got all the privileges like Lanre my classmate – free books (exercise and textbooks), pencils, erasers, maths sets, free lunch throughout my secondary school under the late Lateef Jakande, without anyone threatening my parents that they must vote for him or leave Lagos. Between Nnamdi Azikiwe, Obafemi Awolowo and Shehu Shagari, people chose who to vote freely. Nobody ever told the Igbo that it was not “respecting the people that accommodated them” by not voting Awo or Jakande. I saw Igbo people win Jakande houses in Lagos, where many of them live till date. What’s this strange politics of either you vote for a particular candidate or be pushed into the lagoon or respecting the culture of the people? In Nigeria? Haba!
Segun, did Kemi Badnoch contest for British Prime Minister, one of the powerful jobs in the world, because Yoruba people wanted to take over the United Kingdom? What then is giving you the impetus to restrict Ndigbo from aspiring or voting the candidate of their choice? What would you say if Yoruba in Kano or Akwa Ibom are asked not to vote or support a particular candidate, else they’d be run out of town?
We hear that outside the other measures being put in place, stopping Ndigbo, as has been tried in the past and as seen when some hoodlums tried to stop them from registering with INEC, is part of the game-plan of your patrons to win in 2023. Well, let’s see how that pans out. But before then, just know that not a single person can tell Ndigbo what to do. Dem neva born the person. Not in Igboland, not anywhere! So, go ahead and incite those who would accede to this strange, but dangerous trend in Lagos. But, remember, whoever strikes a machete on a rock, should be wary of the specks piercing his eyes.
As for Peter Obi. There are thousands, if not millions of Yoruba supporting him, just as there are thousands, if not millions supporting Tinubu, including two well-know South East governors. I’m sure nobody has forgotten the yeoman’s job of my brother and friend, Joe Igbokwe is doing in this regard. So, much as you try to pigeonhole Obi into an ethnic closet, it will fail. Nigerians know better.
“Nowadays, when a man cannot get an erection, or impregnate his wife, he blames it on NADECO.” I think that was Abraham Adesanya, one of the heroes of the June 12 era, who birthed what you and I are enjoying today who made that statement.
I still remember how it came about. It was to the effect that NADECO was blamed for everything including the bombings in Lagos, in the same manner you and your gang are now blaming Ndigbo. You know the outcome, don’t you?!
As a reporter in Enugu then, I not only bore the imprimatur of the much-advertised Lagos-Ibadan axis of the press of that era, I bore and still bear the scars of military koboko and the memories of my police detention. One of them was that by the time I came back from the proscription of The Guardian, my fiance was pregnant and about to wed another man! Go figure!
So, continue. But don’t forget the story of Nwakpuda. If you know, you know!
Have you been watching the drama happening in ADC? I have, and I have been thoroughly amused doing so. Have you been following the television appearances of Rotimi Amaechi recently? Did you see how the former Governor of Rivers State had been vibrating, assuring of his victory at the party’s presidential primaries?
Did you hear him boasting how he was going to vanquish Atiku Abubakar, former Vice President and now the presidential candidate of the party, indicating that ADC members would prefer him over the seventh-time election-contesting Nigerian record holder, because of his (Amaechi’s) records?
Did you see the vehemence with which he warned that television host, to “stop that nonsense,” for suggesting that he could end up as the VP candidate to the same Atiku? Did you see how he rolled his bulging eyes and how angry he sounded?
Did you read the statement of the former Minister of Transportation, rejecting the outcome of the ADC presidential primaries, even before it was finally announced on Wednesday.
Now, pan the camera to the Abuja home of the same Amaechi – by the way – I could swear the ambiance could compete with the palace of the Sultan of Brunei – how did he do it – but how could I forget his wife is a money-minting machine!
Did you see the selfsame man with Atiku? Did you notice the difference? Did you notice the robustness, the comicalness? Did you watch the chumminess and the camaraderie? What meaning did you read into it? You actually have to be an initiate to correctly read everything perfectly.
Just wait for a few days to hear the announcement. I won’t be the one to tell you that the huffing and puffing, the air-punching and the table-banging is all for one thing – the VP position.
For those who had advocated that Obi stayed back and contested with Atiku, it would have been a fatal gambit. He would have come a distant third in the contest, competing with Mohammed Hayatu-Deen. Not because it will be so by the desires of the members, but the goons, wanted it so and would have made it so.
Even the position of the VP which hitherto had been bandied as his for the asking, would have eluded him. Amaechi was there to pick it up.
You heard Dele Momodu an accomplice in that plot telling you that Amaechi was more experienced than Obi in that interview with Charles Aniagolu on ARISE NEWS Television’s Prime Time.
It was all figured out. If Peter Obi had fallen to the plot he would have been the greatest political mugu of the century. He would have rubbished the rock-strong foundation on which his profile was built and stands today – as businessman and politician.
Indeed the plot appeared skewed towards not only making him wave goodbye to politics forever, but caast a huge slur on his exhilarating credentials that account to his being celebrated as one of the most successful Nigerian business tycoons today.
Only a few seconds and the trap would have snapped. Had he waited a few days more in that ADC environment, it would have been over. He would have been trapped in the odd situation of point of no return.
By now he would have become an object of mockery and an item of sport for his enemies. Tons of them would be having a bellyful of laughter over his ordeal by now – had he wasted a second more.
But having that laugh would mean that the eagle has lost its lustre. Obi isn’t Obi just by name. Now, here is the Obi they wanted to trick into a trap. Still in his early 20s, he drove three cars he bought with his own money before graduating from the university.
First year – a Volkswagen Beetle (today’s Venza) – second year a Peugeot 505 (today’s Prado) – third year – a BMW (Today’s Maybach). Now think of yourself as a student then. Think of your children that are students today. That would bring you closer to the persona in question.
It didn’t end there. Still as an undergraduate, he owned the supermarket on campus. There was more. He built residential houses and became a landlord to students and locals in the university community – one of them, said to be Abubakar Sa’ad, the current Sultan of Sokoto, who was then a military officer.
De hear o! This same Obi, was among the 1,000-ONLY, UK customers the American Express Bank gave their Platinum Cards. You know what that means. In the whole of the UK – including oyibo people of all nationalities doing business.
Before his 33rd birthday, this Obi, had become Chairman of a commercial bank and director of other blue-chip companies. At the same age when his colleagues still clutch files in their armpits in pursuit of jobs, he was already heading a conglomerate of firms dealing with supplies and distribution of goods.
So, add all these up! Imagine the number of intriguing situations he must have dealt with in this long journey. Imagine the boardroom politics. Imaging the various business tricks he must have survived.
In politics, this same Obi practically cut off the head of the political monster prowling Anambra for years.
Before his arrival, the whole of the state was one huge conflagration and cataclysm. Elements sponsored by patrons of evil had razing down structures including the Government House of governor’s residence. Anambra was all chaos – a huge bedlam!
But all these Obi faced and conquered, arresting the tempest, quietening the tide and smoothening the waves – not without battles – there was a deluge of them – but with willpower, wisdom, tenacity, consistency, and above all – courage.
He battled the electoral heist that stole his original mandate, won, then impeachment, triumphed, then abrupt tenure termination, challenged it and returned to power – battled entrenched interests in the labour unions – teachers, doctors, workers – et al – prevailed and handed down a new Anambra sitting on the foundation of sobriety and good behaviour.
Now this was the man they wanted to trick. Obi’s case would have been that of the late John Chukwu, the hero in the tragicomedy, Isubru Ekperi – described as the crab which swam across the mighty ocean, but fell in the woman’s pot of soup.
Had Obi, stayed in ADC to contest against Atiku, his fate would have mimicked Okonkwo in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, whom for fear of being thought weak, destroyed his own destiny by killing Ikemefuna and ended up committing suicide! But providence was on his side;
Thankfully, he did not. And today, NDC provides a new horizon. Nigerians are being provided the opportunity of a new country, that could rise from the ashes of the old order – a clean break from the past – a new hope of awakening the sleeping giant!
The Tiny Voice!
By Sunny Igboanugo
On Wednesday, April 22, 2026, Goodluck Jonathan, Nigeria’s 14th leader and the fourth elected President was at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on a visit to President Bola Tinubu. Nobody knew the content of that visit because discussions were conducted closed doors.
However, knowing Tinubu, would anything concerning him ever be free of politics, especially given the nuances of the season? Would the snake ever give birth to a creature that is short?
Naturally, as it is wont with Nigeria where one event takes over from the other in quick successions, the Jonathan visit, naturally disappeared – buried inside the reservoir of public consciousness.
But then, things have begun to unfold that people are not only now returning to that April visit, but are taking notes as well as connecting the dots.
Nothing yet seems definite, except in the realm of the popular local saying that when a witch cries at night and the baby dies in the morning, the people know where to look.
Indeed, the droppings of the caterpillar on the ground is making people look up to the tree to see if they are actually eating the green leaves on them. Naturally, events around the 14th President, do not look ordinary – at least not that ordinary to escape more than a scant public scrutiny.
So, when on Thursday May 7, 2026 youths stormed the Abuja office of the ex-President urging him to run for the office he left in 2015, after his historic defeat by Muhammadu Buhari, it elicited a deeper interest from the previous attempts. Yes! It wasn’t the first time Nigerians would be making the pitch. Several groups had tried in the past, even as far back as the 2023 elections.
So, the attempt three weeks ago, was not new. But, this time, eyebrows were raised all the same because it seemed to conduce more intriguing interpretations. Therefore, instead of mere passing interests, Nigerians are now interrogating deeply, putting two and two together.
How much did the former President know about that visit? Did those youths ambush him or was he in the know that such a visit would take place? Was it what is known here as an arrangee – a well-crafted political facade?
Then came the angle of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). A long time ago, when speculations were rife that Peter Obi, was being courted by the former ruling party to return and run for the 2027 presidential election on its platform, Jerry Gana, a stalwart of the party had served notice that they even had a more seducing and deliverable option. It turned out to be Jonathan.
So, long before the Nyesom Wike devastating blow on the party that has kept it in its prostrate state, Jonathan had been on the cards as the number one option for the party. Therefore, it follows that the current steps the party is taking to draft him in, to run as its candidate in the election, is normal. But is it?
The argument in PDP quarters for the Jonathan choice is because he is the only one constitutionally barred from contesting a second term, he is the most fitted to satisfy all shades of political interests in Nigeria today, especially the North eager to return to power. Quite scintillating.
But seducing as this appears, there is a hugely compelling argument against the move. A groundswell of analysts swear that the ex-President is being pushed into the ring as an instrument to stop Peter Obi, the current moving train threatening to crush the ambition of Tinubu to remain in office beyond 2027. In other words, the sole reason is to play the spoiler role.
Supposing this is the reason. Then what is before us is more fatal than critical. This is the same Jonathan whose singular act of calling Buhari that morning on March 31, 2015 to concede defeat, suddenly catapulted him to a global democratic icon – the same that hops into presidential planes to other countries in Africa to straighten crooked democratic roads.
Now, would the same Jonathan swear with his church mind that Tinubu’s model of democracy is what he would prescribe even for an enemy country, let alone Nigeria? What aspect of the country has Tinubu not damaged. So, what would make him a Tinubu’s ally in the further destruction of Nigeria, if he truly loves the country?
This was the same Jonathan who swore that his ambition was not worth the blood of any Nigerian. Is he not aware that the land on which he’s standing is already soaked with the blood of the same citizens by the sheer butchery that is happening daily in the country under the nose of the most underwhelming President yet? Isn’t this the issue now?
Indeed, not a few people have argued that Jonathan should be in the forefront of the Obi project. For one, Obi was once his appointee apart from being a sworn ally. So, he would be in a position to ascertain his true qualities first hand and confirm that he’s the only one among the lot that could fix the country. Even an imbecile knows that Obi would create the clean break from the past that Nigeria needs today to build the future everyone desires.
Besides, he Jonathan, if anything is substantially part of the reason the South East is in its current state at the moment, the level of support the area gave him throughout his tenure is part of the reason the late Buhari increased his hatred for the Igbo a million times more – a phenomenon he transferred through the APC to Tinubu – and which the current President has been unable to extricate himself from.
Okay, is the former President not aware that the position Tinubu is sitting on today belongs to the South East – the zone that took him like one of them that they even gave him an Igbo name – Ebele. If everyone else shortchanges Ndigbo, would he also join, given the foregoing? What manner of ingratitude would that be?
O yes! He has had his Villa meeting. PDP has adopted him as their candidate. Even the legal barrier that would have stopped him, was cleared on Monday when Justice Peter Lifu of the Federal High Court, Abuja, handed him the all-clear sign. He has told the world that he is consulting. While at it, hopefully, more people would tell him the home truth.
Fortunately, he was the one who said it is easy to wake someone that is actually asleep than someone pretending to be asleep. Regrettably, by his silence since the obscene drama began, it appears he prefers the latter. Therefore, his action would not derive from ignorance.
If he finally bites at the apple, it wouldn’t be because he didn’t know how much Tinubu has messed up Nigeria and the implication of reinforcing him with another four years.
His complicity wouldn’t mean that he doesn’t know what to do to reverse the trend. It would only mean that personal interest has taken the better part of him and not the love of the country.
If he deliberately makes that choice, with both eyes open, then he’s welcome in the hall of infamy rather than honour. Fortunately, there is still a window to prove that the foregoing was a mere political nightmare and not reality. But otherwise, it would be apposite for Nigerians to say in unison – GOODLUCK?
My name is Sunny Igboanugo, I’m The Tiny Voice!
Option A4, occupies a central place in Nigeria’s democratic development. That unique election model developed and introduced in the Nigerian electoral process by Humphrey Nwosu, the late Professor of Political Science, has become a symbol mounted on a standard and raised high above the sky.
It is Nigeria’s mimic of that biblical golden serpent to which both the nation and its citizens look up at and derive instant succour – much like a balm to their heavily-lacerated democratic soul – a wonder device, that once mesmerised the world.
Yes! Anytime Nigerians want to serenade their democratic spirit with the allure of sweetness, they take a recourse to that unique event that happened more than three decades ago, on June 12, 1993. They reminisce on the purity of the process and beauty of the outcome.
Like the saying that precious things come in simple packages, Option A4, was not only as simple as simplicity itself, but was as powerful as the most impactive dynamite – simple enough to break all barriers of ignorance and powerful enough to destroy all electoral bad behaviours defacing the beautiful perspective of democracy.
Here is the process. Voters converge on a location at approved time, get accredited, queue behind preferred candidates, get counted and the votes recorded in approved result sheets. Finish! No ballot-snatching, no ballot-stuffing, no quarrel, no thuggery, no blood on the floor.
Even the issue of proper voting that lead to void votes is eradicated by the process. The electorates need no education on how to vote properly. The issue of thumb-printing in the wrong space or double-voting is taken care of.
Today, in Nigeria, June 12 is designated as Democracy Day, based on the outcome of that election. It was so seamless and produced such a perfect result that the product – Moshood Kashimawo Olawale (MKO) Abiola was never challenged on the inviolability, but on the other ideas the military government in power then had.
But did you see the same Option A4 put to test under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu? Did you watch the primaries of the All Progressive Congress (APC), at various stages, including the one that produced the President as candidate of the party in the 2027 presidential election? If you did, you would understand where your country is currently and where it is headed.
How could anyone have the mindset to deface such a beauty, let alone design a mechanism to destroy it, given its centrality as the bastion of Nigerian democratic commemorations? How could anyone be so wicked as to destroy the most beautiful Nigerian democratic ornament?
It is like pulling the original of Monalisa or the best of Bini Bronze from their protective encasements and smashing them on the floor. It takes a mindset that has scant regard for beauty – a destructive spirit to do so.
But see how easily they did it! See how simple it was for them. It was as easy as jumping from 10 to 1,000 in a simple counting process a primary school child could do.
Did you see the smiles on their faces to indicate how much fun they had supervising the putrid, outlandish and parlous construct – like the lurid expression of a rapist seeking to satiate his lust? Clearly, it did not matter to them the danger they’re putting themselves and future generations – comprising their children and grandchildren, Tragedy!
But what is it that Tinubu and his co-travellers have not destroyed since happening on Nigeria? What pain have they not wrought on the polity? Is it the economy? Think of those rich Nigerians alighting from their fancy cars and jumping into the Lagos Lagoon.
Is it security? Reminisce on the last moments of General Sani Uba, as he watched the approach of the terrorists while crouching on his knees in the forest, having lost the vain hope that his country would save him.
Think of the Oyo school teacher in that final moment as he waited for the impact of that sharp knife on his bare throat, while being slaughtered like a goat at the abattoir. Think of Zamfara, think of Sokoto, think of Kwara, think of Anambra – add to the list – think Nigeria.
Yet, the APC foot-soldiers – including a Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives – a leader in the legislature – the most important institution of democracy – clowned, jested and had fun.
For them, the rest of the country doesn’t matter. All that matters is Tinubu’s happiness. And the master-strategist, the democratic doyen, the June 12-NADECO icon, was all and about, grinning from ear to ear and lapping everything up.
With economy destroyed from day-one with the impulsive, brainwave – subsidy is gone declaration – with security in tatters that school children, now scurry and scamper in different directions like scared rodents, at the slightest sight of strange faces for fear of being the next kidnap victims – with the national fibric almost giving way from the consistent and unrelenting pressure in running the most nepotistic administration – far worse than the days of the late Muhammadu Buhari, thought to be the worst at a time – what else remains of Nigeria?
Before now, I had grieved that Tinubu deliberately left out Humphery Nwosu in that outlandish June 12 struggle honourees list, when he ought to be the numero uno. I had hoped however that someday, someone more amenable than Tinubu would do the needful. But what hope is there now that Tinubu and his men are tightening the noose on Nigerian democracy? Now this!
The worst part is not that the APC goons committed this heinous atrocity, but in the manner they did. They enjoyed the process. Only mindless characters such as mafia kingpins we watch in movies, take pleasure in inflicting pains. That we now watch such playing out in real life is not only disturbing, it is THE TRAGEDY!
My name is Sunny Igboanugo, I’m The Tiny Voice!
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