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Chief Obasanjo of Ota
I saw it coming from the dark, hazy horizon of our nascent political climate. Since last week, the predominant commentary from the southern media has been to lampoon all those who spoke out against the horrendously misguided and inherently mischievous statements credited to Olusegun Obasanjo in which he accused the current administration for "Fulanization" and "Islamization" of Nigeria.
Suddenly, the same Obasanjo, who, for several decades, was regarded as both a villain and traitor for handing over the levers of power to the democratically elected government of the late Alhaji Shehu Shagari can do no wrong! All his ‘crimes’ have now been completely wiped off the slate. His mugshot no longer resides in certain principalities in the south of the nation were the records of profound political crimes are profiled and documented.
In Nigeria, our Civil Rights activists, opinion leaders and the so-called elites have perfected the art of routinely consuming their own vomit. The development is typically Nigerian. For striking the right chord, which profoundly resonated with their most primitive impulses, former President Olusegun Obasanjo; the rotund and perennially vindictive chicken farmer whose scorecard in the military and political life of the nation drew unprintable scorn and ridicule from his own kinsmen in the southwest as a direct consequence of his endless scheming and diabolical plots within the polity, has emerged the hero to be celebrated and protected from the abuse of his transducers.
This was the same Obasanjo who shamelessly and unconstitutionally withheld local government allocations for Lagos state for as long as it suited him during his presidency. The same Obasanjo who sneered at the adoption of June 12 as the Democracy Day, and; yes, the same Obasanjo who infamously declared that the late Chief Moshood Abiola who paid the supreme sacrifice in his effort to emerge as the president of the nation, was not the messiah Nigerians were waiting for!
He will be the last to admit it, but Obasanjo has apparently discovered a strategy to redeem his badly tarnished image among 'his people' by doing the one thing that has routinely provided ‘general amnesty’ to ethnic champions, religious bigots, and serial looters of the nation's treasury since our independence whenever they are boxed into corner or completely run out of ideas! He has deployed the three aces in their pack of cards by appealing to religious, ethnic and sectional sentiments in the vain search for the relevance he lost for backing the wrong horse in the last presidential elections!
Since average Nigerians remain profoundly gullible and are always blinded by sentiments in the interrogation of national developments, Obasanjo is now reveling in the moment to rehabilitate his badly battered image for the ‘betrayal’ of his primary constituency in 1979 with the handover to Shagari. He has now joined the queue of those who heaped all the blames for the nation's foibles since 1960 on the North, Hausa-Fulani, and Islam, in no particular order.
The same Obasanjo Wole Soyinka serially dismissed as the lackey and apologist for the northern ruling oligarchy for decades, has metamorphosed into a knight in shining armor to be celebrated with aplomb. He has even cautioned all those who dared to question Obasanjo's misguided views on the nation's current security challenges to watch their tongues. Incredible!
In the coming days and months, we can also expect other closet anarchists from a faction of Afenifere, the section of Ohanaeze-Ndigbo sympathetic to Nnamdi Kanu and IPOB, along with their hirelings in the media and the diaspora to join the bandwagon! The new and most beautiful 'bride' in Nigeria now apparently resides on mountain top in Abeokuta. Since his preferred candidate was comprehensively trounced in the presidential elections a few months ago, Chief Obasanjo can now apparently afford to relax and soak in the accolades from 'his people'.
The former Commander of the Third Marine Commando Division of the Nigerian Army who also received the instruments of surrender from Biafran forces, apparently feels no qualms exploiting the nation’s current security challenges to score a cheap political point. Not only that, he has also seized the opportunity and the moment to dispel the notion mischievously created that he has always done the bidding of the northern establishment with two additions to the nation's political lexicon: "Fulanization" and "Islamization". Quite inevitably, he has also re-classified himself as a regional or tribal leader.
With his divisive utterances Obasanjo has provided all discerning Nigerians with the grounds to question his nationalist, if not patriotic credentials many suspected to be hazy when he authored the book on his bosom friend Chukwuma Nzegwu! And perhaps we should all have seen this coming from his actions immediately he was sworn in as the civilian president in 1999.
Didn't he say something to the effect that all those who 'invested' in his elevation from the cells of Yola prison to Aso Rock losing their investments?
Did he not maliciously retire the cream of northern officers in the military on a whim soon after his inauguration?
What about the spiteful relocation of the administrative headquarters of some federal agencies like the Nigeria Ports Authority and the Shippers Council back to Lagos in 1999?
Can we even dare to pretend that his economic policies did not emasculated the predominant textiles industry in the north out of existence and contributed to our economic ruin?
Can we not say the same about agriculture?
Was it not the same OBJ who foisted a terminally ill Umaru Musa Yar'Adua on the nation which saddled us with a constitutional crisis that resulted in the kleptomaniac presidency of Goodluck Jonathan?
The truth, if we are daring enough to confront it, is that OBJ has never been the patriot and nationalistic leader he pretended to be all these past decades. He is not for the north, just like he has never been for the Southwest, Southeast, South-South, ‘Middle-Belt’ or any part of the country for that matter! Should we not have drawn the same conclusions after his volte-face on the candidacy of Atiku Abubakar before the last general elections?
On the contrary, Obasanjo prefers the nation and its collective destiny to remain perpetually entangled in his massive arms like a toy to be manipulated in his own image as he pleased and managed in the manner that suited his insatiable ego. He is a relevance seeker who nonchalantly gave away a part of the nation’s prime real estate – the Bakassi Peninsula – so he could curry favour from the West after a previously failed bid to become the Secretary-General of the United Nations.
Oba Rilwan Akiolu of Lagos was right. Rather than waste anytime grieving about Obasanjo’s antics and self-inflicted injuries, we must thank God that his badly bruised ego from the outcome of the last general elections and his failure to twist the destiny of the nation in his exact image, yet again, inadvertently resulted in his eternal de-mystification.
And, on the basis of his latest imprudent intervention, we should all rejoice that his hypocritical and pampered facade of a patriot, statesman and nationalist of any value is now surely gone with the wind!
He is now proudly Chief Olusegun Obasanjo of Ota! |