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Benue: Facing A Common Enemy By Aonduna Tondu
There is a depressingly familiar hue to the current crisis plaguing the Benue chapter of the PDP – the so-called People’s Democratic Party. At the heart of the contrived intra-party conflict is the perfidious attempt by that regime in Abuja and his perverse determination to use local surrogates in his revenge mission against those perceived as having opposed his evil third term scheme. The Benue people and the Tiv in particular are yet to recover from the barbaric and criminal military invasion the Aso Rock tyrant ordered against them in 2001 and which resulted in the massacre of innocent civilians, not to mention the scorched earth destruction of entire villages and communities.
This latest assault by Obasanjo is meant to further create disharmony amongst the local people. If unchecked, its consequences, both in the short and long term, not just for governance but for the general peace of the place will be too grave to bear. Hence the imperative on the part of the political as well as the intellectual leadership of the state to rise and confront in a united front what is no doubt the incarnation of all that is wrong with Nigeria today – a common foe whose recklessness and casual disregard for the welfare of the masses seem to know no bounds. Benue will face the Obasanjo menace squarely, with the ultimate concern being the defense of the overarching interests of the citizenry whose support must be mustered to confront the scourge.
Nobody should be under the illusion that, thanks to Governor Akume’s reported ‘appeasement’ overtures, this antediluvian creature of mischief has all of a sudden shed his nasty nature and has given up his ill-advised attempt at destabilizing his administration just like he did elsewhere in Bayelsa, Oyo, Ekiti, Anambra and Plateau. Akume and the people of the state cannot afford to lower their guard in the forlorn hope that the beast has been tamed. Obasanjo is incorrigible in his rottenness and there is evidence of that everywhere even in this ‘fin de règne’. And like elsewhere, beyond the travails of the governor at the hands of a conniving tyrant and his co-conspirators, we should feel concerned by the destructive impact on the people and the polity of the dictator’s creepily arrogant designs in Benue. The tyrant should be deemed as persona non grata there and those locally offering support to his vicious acts considered as accessories to his criminal ways and therefore deserving of disdain and communal censure.
Apparently unable to use his Gestapo, also referred to as the EFCC against the state governor, George Akume – a staunch anti-third term politician – the despot from Ota is said to have recruited the services of prominent local politicians in the likes of Barnabas Gemade, Paul Unongo and David Mark. As a matter of fact, Mark is an unabashed supporter of the ‘term elongation’ gamble and what he believes should be the pre-eminence of military dictatorship in our national politics. So, when this ex-soldier and his new-found allies – the Gemades and the Abu King Shiluwas – embrace the politics of skullduggery and pestilential imposition as dictated from Aso Rock, they are invariably advertising their comfort regarding what Obasanjo has come to symbolize in Benue and the rest of the country.
The Abuja tyrant obviously thinks that by having the illegitimate chairman of his PDP – one Colonel (rtd) Ahmadu Ali - order the illegal take over of the state structures of the party by individuals beholden to him and his clique, he is teaching a lesson to Governor Akume and his ally, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu, Vice-President Atiku’s campaign manager. As part of his revanchist gambit, a main objective of Obasanjo orchestrating an anti-Akume campaign in Benue is to have delegates to the forthcoming national PDP convention that will basically be in the pockets of the Aso Rock ogre. Surely, Nigerians should forcefully reject this crude attempt at the continued bastardization of their democracy. If the aim of the likes of Gemade and Unongo in particular were to genuinely help advance democracy with its attendant salutary effect on development in the state, their position would be supported by Benue indigenes and the citizenry in general. Sadly, what seems to be happening in the orchestrated schisms within the Benue PDP, if not within Tivland per se, is that local politicians with grievances - justified or not - against the Akume administration have uncritically, it would seem, signed up to a macabre show of shame scripted by Nigerians’ worst nightmare called Olusegun Obasanjo. But two wrongs do not make a right and Paul Unongo of all people should have known better.
It goes without saying that Wantaregh – meaning, the revered one - as Unongo , a minister in the former Shagari government is fondly referred to by his followers, has disappointed many who hold him in high esteem as a visionary politician. Unongo it is whose seminal epistle, “Where do we Go From Here” (1969), has helped in the shaping of progressive political thought regarding minority issues in the Middle Belt and Nigeria in general. It is rather sad that today, despite his intellectual and political contributions to Project Nigeria, this formidable statesman is seen playing second fiddle to a disaster in the Obasanjo mould. When asked in an interview a few weeks ago by the Abuja newspaper called Leadership why he decided to decamp from the All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP) to the PDP, Wantaregh poured encomiums on the Aso Rock dictator, and almost as if in an afterthought, lamented what he implied was the near-moribund state of his former party. In a nutshell, what comes across in Unongo’s rationalization is desperation dressed in a garb of political altruism. There is even a note of Obasanjo-like heresy to it. “…My basic concern is where can I go to maximize opportunity for me to do good. I use my money, I use my advantages to do good, but it is not enough. God wants me to do more. The only way I can do it, is to connive to be in government, so we can show people that they have good people in government”!, he said. This is political opportunism as derived from the script of Nigeria’s ‘born-again’ posturing.
It must be said that Wantaregh has every right as an individual to congregate with whomever he so chooses. But the moment his choice acquires the potential of being harmful to the public good, the stated intention notwithstanding, he should be called to order. Unongo should have stayed in the ANPP and worked for the rejuvenation of the party instead of opting for the facile but dubious route of PDP-based political relevance. Outside the PDP, he stood a far better chance of truly contributing toward the enhancement of democracy and the rule of law in Benue and the rest of Nigeria. He can yet redeem himself between now and the 2007 elections by joining hands with other citizens and actually working toward the defeat and eventually the demise of Baba Aremu’s election-rigging outfit.
A final word of caution: The Benue people have had only but woeful experiences at the hands of dictators. Unrepresentative government is bad news. It is neither in their short nor longtime interest to be seen as supporting the extension or continuation of military tyranny in whatever guise as the David Mark-Obasanjo alliance of proxy politics would seem to suggest. As for the Abuja despot, let this be another warning to him that his day of reckoning is fast approaching. He will be called upon to answer – either in Nigeria or abroad - for his crimes against humanity during the 2001 military invasion of Zaki-Biam and surrounding communities. His latest misadventure in the state has only made his case much worse.
Aonduna Tondu
New York
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