During the oil subsidy crisis, he thoroughly bad- mouthed Yorubas and canvassed that non-Yoruba elements in Lagos, who he claimed are more than Yorubas, should gang up against their hosts
While some of us continue to relish the past and insist that our leadership position is not threatened, the more discerning among us realise that failure to correctly appraise the situation could only be calamitous to the destiny of the Yoruba people. The truth of the matter is that the lives and destiny of over 30 million souls cannot and should not be trampled upon by reprobates, renegades, revisionists, and impostors. The contemporary self-proclaimed spokesmen and supposed protectors of our people just have to cease and desist from their sanctimonious and opportunistic crusade and become true subscribers to the common cause’.
The Jurisprudential Professor of Professors, Akin Oyebode, in his lead paper at the authentic Pan -Yoruba Summit in Ibadan, Thursday, 19 March 2015.
‘For the love of country’, ‘for the love of country’ etc. So goes one of the multibillion naira television adverts of President Goodluck Jonathan urging Nigerians to vote him for another term of four years with his duplicitous government that keeps assuring foreign envoys of peaceful elections while for two whole months it has continued to deny visas to over twenty foreign journalists from such stables as the influential The Telegraph, The Times and Channel 4 News; something that should take no more than two weeks. Candidate Jonathan showed the extent of his love for Nigeria and Nigerians this past week when he inspired the country’s wretched of the earth, to lay Lagos prostrate. Earlier, another phalange of these miscreants, operating under the aegis of the anti-Nigerian ragtag organisation which recently publicly launched vehicle and driver’s licences, as well as what it called the passports of its still-born Biafra Republic without a whimper from the security agencies- by the way, dollarized Afenifere should try doing the same for Oduduwa Republic to gauge the real depth of Jonathan’s love for Yoruba. Unlike them, however, those under the lead of the carpenter completely shut down Lagos and laid it prostrate for hours, causing the citizenry untold hardship. The scallywags, members of the outlawed Oodua People’s Congress (OPC), who had long become thugs -for hire, brandishing assorted guns and live ammunition, broken bottles etc, with the PDP- police and DSS, even soldiers, watching in amusement, smashed their way through Ikorodu Road, laying waste everything on its way, including APC billboards. With the resultant traffic snarl, Lagos was completely crippled for a whole day.
In his desperation, President Jonathan showed, through these characters, that he would not mind a version of Boko Haram sprouting in Yoruba land the way they brandished live ammunition without a single security operative raising an eyebrow. Coming so soon after the president included both Fredrick Faseun and Gani Adams in his reckless pipeline surveillance contracts, both factions of the Oodua People’s Congress have shown themselves no better than mercenaries as they were campaigning for the president’s re election which they believe the INEC chairman’s sack, even if in total disregard of laid down procedure, will guarantee. And I ask, what exactly is driving President Jonathan into this paranoia: love of country or an eagerness to cover up the massive looting under his watch?
And this is what baffles about his Lagos/ Yoruba politics. During the oil subsidy crisis, he thoroughly bad- mouthed Yorubas and canvassed that non-Yoruba elements in Lagos, who he claimed are more than Yorubas, should gang up against their hosts. During the current campaigns, he has met with literally every ethnic group residing in Lagos, preaching the same serpentine hate message. Yet, both within and outside Lagos, he has spared nothing in presenting as a Yoruba friend; romancing Afenifere and heavily compromising all, but few of Yoruba Obas. Such duplicity!
Happily, Yorubas know their friends just as they know a Greek gift. The historic desecration of Lagos by the OPC, in a complete reversal of roles by a group founded primarily to defend Yoruba land, will haunt them eternally. This shameless, mammon-induced perfidy will, forever, scare them. How they can so easily shred whatever remains of their tattered integrity since they came under the tutelage of the likes of former Ogun State governor, Gbenga Daniel, simply confounds. It must be mentioned here, for emphasis, that the treaty which ended the Kiriji War in 1886 forbade Yorubas fighting against themselves. Their action is, therefore, an abomination the consequences of which will not escape.
Nigerians must go out on 28 March, 2015 to show that they are not deceived by this type of ‘love of country; by voting out candidate Jonathan.
Six weeks was only a decoy for rigging
Readers of this column must have read me say, severally, that PDP cannot win a mere local government election without rigging. The coming elections will be no different, only the rigging method will change. With Capt Sagir Koli, through the Ekitigate tapes, blowing the cover off the military, at its rigging best, which the likes of Obanikoro had relied upon for victory, and INEC’s PVC and Card Readers now a fait accompli, they are already gunning for new methods. This is precisely what inspired the postponement even after the Council of State had okayed it. My auditory nerves have been on active mode since the Ekiti photocromic rigging, waiting for these shameless riggers. The answer came shortly after the president’s visit to one major Yoruba town. A megalomaniac politician, who, of course, should know the finer details of the plan talked too much to those he believed were his supporters. That was how we got to hear that card readers would be sabotaged and that under no circumstances would President Jonathan hand over to General Buhari. All signals are also to be jammed by agents of the PDP on 28 March, 2015.
Incidentally, it would appear the APC also picked up this information and it’s Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has since addressed a press conference during which he gave more details which included the name of the Israeli fixer contracted to supply 750, 000 units of fake Card Readers which will be planted on PDP members at the polling centres to jam the INEC Card Readers. Olisa Metuh, PDP’s Publicity Secretary, on a Channels TV appearance with Alhaji Mohammed on Thursday, 19 March 2015, had no answer to this allegation.
Traditional rulers on wonder errand for President Jonathan
Nigerians woke up Wednesday, 18, March 2015, to read that the president has sent traditional rulers on some mundane errand across the country; an abomination in the first place. This was, however, not completely surprising having just returned from shaking hands with most of their Southwest colleagues. After all, one good turn, they say, deserves another. Divided into 11 groups, their mission is simple: regardless of the fact that elections have not yet been held, talk less of knowing what the results will be, just go where I send you, seat them down and plead that they accept whatever the outcome, no matter the sanctity of the process. In my opinion, no self regarding person, however hungry, should have accepted this formless assignment. This is why not a few Nigerians have reasonably read meanings into this misadventure. Granted nobody wants a recrudescence of the 2011 post-electoral conflagration, but how do you explain this graceless job? What exactly do President Jonathan and the PDP have in stock for Nigerians?
And what are they agitated about after signing a Memorandum of Undertaking supervised by two of Africa’s greatest international diplomats, Emeka Anyaoku, former Secretary-General of the Commonwealth and Annan, a former United Nations Secretary-General? What is President Jonathan or the PDP afraid of? Why do they think they have to beg Nigerians to accept the outcome of what everybody expects to be a free, fair and transparent election? Is this a case of the guilty becoming sleepless ahead of what would surely be the consequences of a compromised election; no matter what force is arraigned against a cheated people? I think it is important these royal errands ask why this has become a necessary enterprise.
Or does it have anything to do with the rumour making the rounds that Nigerians are about to experience June 12, all over again? Is it true that we could soon have procured, a court judgment at the 11th hour, on Thursday or Friday -26/27 March, 2015 – invalidating the use of card readers?
I feel certain President Jonathan loves Nigeria much more than to have it incinerated.
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