2nd November, 2010
Since the verdict of the Court of Appeal in Ilorin which gave victory to His Excellency Dr Kayode Fayemi on Friday, 15 October 2010, well meaning and progressive Nigerians have been celebrating, thanking God and praising Justice Ayo Salami and his team for the job well done even though it took almost four years to come. Many took to the streets to jubilate. Others went to joints to drink themselves to stupour, while public commentators, political editors, and columnists took the pages of newspapers and magazines to tell their own side of the big story. The story of the long-awaited sweet victory is still being told today and it is still going to be told in many years to come.
But the world may not know what transpired in Dr Kayode Fayemi’s camp in those years of the locusts. First was the fear that if absolute care is not taken, Fayemi may be killed and that will be the end of the story. We have not forgotten what happened to Chief MKO Abiola on July 7, 1998. The predators and destroyers shot us in the foot when Chief Abiola was killed. Consequently, the June 12 revolution suffered a huge setback and with the winner out of the way, it became impossible to ask for the election to be revalidated. Again we saw a deadly attempt on Engr Rauf Aregbesola’s life at Oroki festival in Oshogbo, and if he had not been inside a bullet-proof SUV, nobody would be talking about the man today and his stolen mandate.
With unspeakable joy, full of glory and thanksgiving, I remember the sleepless nights, endless travelling, and the endless meetings in Lagos, Ibadan and Ekiti where strategies were mapped out on how to face the challenges that kept on cropping up hours on end. The frustrations were there. Hopes were rising up and dropping with no end in sight. It will take a book to talk about the anxieties, fatigues and fears of what tomorrow will be. In all this I have come to realise that the struggle for power is no tea party. I am a living witness to the preparations, the networking, the team work, the engagements, perseverance, persistence, the initiatives, ruggedness, total commitment, raw courage, unshakeable determination, endurance and patience. I saw a monumental lesson in integrity, honour and character. I saw the foot soldiers at work and I learnt the power of loyalty.
As a war college scholar, His Excellency Fayemi knows that no coward ever wears the crown of glory. He did not lose hope even when the case was dragging. He did not succumb to blackmail and intimidation from the usurpers of power in Ekiti. He did not listen to hidden persuaders to abandon the war for another day. He was not perturbed that he may lose the battle at the end. His eyes were on the ball. But the story of the struggle will not be told at all without the man behind the scene Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the weight and influence of Lagos State and the leadership of Ekiti State PDP. If the story of Fayemi struggle is a book, Asiwaju of the opposition in Nigeria is the author. This man remains a rare gift to Yoruba land and Nigeria. I can say no less.
On the part of the electoral fraudsters led by Mr Segun Oni, the story is yet to be told of how they sustained the stolen mandate for almost four years. It was a total war and nothing was spared. This writer was in Ekiti State during the re-run elections and I saw how dangerous and desperate they were. The entire state resources were deployed in order to keep the loot. The Nigerian press had a bitter lesson to tell and the documentation of raw deal newsmen suffered in Ekiti State. I saw Oni’s men and women going berserk and mad just to remain in power. Senators Ayo Arise and Omisore took the fight personal because they know that if Oni loses, their position will be on line. Senator Ayo Arise and Omisore (from Osun State ) physically mobilised thugs to main and kill innocent people with impunity.
The delegation from Abuja led by Dimeji Bankole, the Speaker of the House of Representatives provided a shield for Oni’s army to unleash violence on the people of Ekiti without caring a hoot. In all, I came to realise that those who are busy killing, liquidating and destroying this country are not relaxing even for a second. They can do just anything to remain in power. They torture, maim, destroy, kill, and loot. The truth is that if these criminals are not sparing a second to remain in power, we need not spare a millisecond in fighting them. To allow them to gain upper hand is to sacrifice Nigeria. Ah! The people they say get the kind of leaders they deserve. This is a struggle and there are two options: To fight to dislodge these people and retrieve our stolen country or to surrender to them. The choice is ours!
Through criminal manipulations, deceit, brigandage, wickedness and petty jealousy, General Obasanjo became the sole beneficiary of June 12, 1993 revolution when the winner of that election, Chief Moshood Abiola was murdered in 1998. Chief Obasanjo and Chief Olu Falae became the two Presidential candidates of PDP and Alliance for Democracy because the political criminals of Nigeria led by IBB and company could not just continue. The electoral process that produced Obasanjo as president in 1999 was so heavily manipulated and so rigged that Falae went to court to challenge it but was persuaded by eminent Nigerians to withdraw his case so that the cabal will not use it as an excuse to scuttle the democratic process again. Obasanjo became the president even though he lost his ward, his local government, his state and entire South-West.
The world expected that Obasanjo would appreciate the sacrifices made by his kinsmen to save him from Abacha’s gulag, all the troubles his kinsmen went through in the days of IBB and Abacha, the supreme sacrifice made by hundreds of people especially from the South-West during the June 12 struggle. The world thought that Obasanjo would appreciate Chief MKO Abiola, Dr Sola Omatshola, Chief Mrs. Kudirat Abiola, Alfred Rewane, Vice Admiral Babatunde Elegbede, Toyin Onagoruwa, Suliat Adedeji, Bagauda Kalto, Commodore Olu Omotehinwa and others for dying for democracy.
The moment he came into power, Obasanjo forgot all this and kicked away the ladder he used to ascend to power. He did not bother even to remember or recognise Chief Abiola’s huge sacrifice. Shortly before the 2003 elections, Obasanjo had series of meetings with his kinsmen in the South-West including the AD governors of Lagos, Ekiti, Ogun, Oyo, Ondo, and Osun States. OBJ was presented with a long list of what should be done to move the whole nation forward. Each one they raised OBJ accepted, and because of this the governors agreed in principle to support his second term bid so long as he will fulfill his own side of the bargain. Talks were still going on when Chief Bola Ige the nation’s Attorney General was murdered in Ibadan. His murder put spanners in the works but eventually a middle course was found.
Through massive rigging again and even with the agreement Obasanjo was elected and the moment he grabbed power he turned the other way. Armed with the instrumentality of all Nigeria’s security forces Obasanjo rigged the governors of Oyo, Ogun, Ondo, Ekiti, Osun out of power except the state of Lagos. It was the most trying moment in the politics of the South West. It was a colossal betrayal, unbelievable deceit, unparallel wickedness and back stabbing. It was during that most trying period that the wife of Chief Bola Ige, Justice Atinuke Ige died in Ibadan. At the memorial service at St Ann ’s Anglican Church Molete, Ibadan, I saw the devastating effect of the betrayal on AD leaders led by the late Chief Abraham Adesanya. You need to see the worries, the anxieties, the mood and the pains written all over them where as they sat inside the church. When the service was over I saw them outside the church looking abandoned, subdued, dejected, downcast, down and out and I knew instantly that Chief Abraham Adesanya may not survive the betrayal. The rest is now history.
Today, almost eight years after, the South West except Lagos is in ruins. From Oyo to Ogun, from Ekiti to Osun, from Edo to Ondo State the story has been the same, crisis all the way, until Ondo, Edo and Ekiti were liberated recently from the clutches of PDP. No wonder Proverbs 20:17 says “Bread of deceit is sweet to a man but afterward his mouth shall be filled with gravelâ€
As 2010 approaches the signals are there that the end of PDP in the South West is near. The signals are there that the chickens are coming home to roost almost eight years after the betrayal of 2003. The signs are there that history which neither personal wealth nor power can suppress will pass terrible judgment in the fullness of time. The signs are there that no matter how long you keep a stolen item the world knows that it does not belong to you.
Governor Gbenga Daniel lamented recently the loss of Ekiti State to ACN and cried that if Ekiti State liberation is anything to go by, PDP is finished in the South West. Now if there is free and fair elections in Nigeria in 2011, if it is one man, one vote, if our votes count in 2011, PDP will not only be a goner in the South West and some other states in Nigeria, the Presidency will go also. Basking in the euphoria of stealing the Presidency in 2011, Obasanjo told the then AD Governors in the South West to pack and go. In 2011 it is time for PDP to pack and go, and we intend to achieve this not through criminality, manipulation and subterfuge but through free and fair elections, one man one vote. And Nigeria will be liberated from the criminal grip of PDP. This I promise. Case rested!
•Joe Igbokwe, Publicity Secretary ACN writes from Lagos.
