By the time this election is over, many of those who hitherto had represented themselves as been something, would end up becoming nothing, particularly that kind of nothing, so nothing-like that to remember it in a long time, would be sought and not found. This election will cause a hurricanic reversal of roles, in which those, whose life profession has all along been the siphoning of the free for all crude-oil supplied ill-gotten wealth in Abuja, would be condemned to a long lease in the dustbin of history. Sorry, did I just refer to this as an election? Oh, that must have been a slip. Maybe my intro just happened to have adopted the appellation INEC decided, within the confines of its constitutional mandate, to give to what will be happening on Saturday. But before I further proceed, let me say I disagree. I do not just disagree, I vehemently disagree. We must call a spade a spade. This is not an election. No, it is not. This is a referendum. Yes, it is. This is a referendum in which, in an opportunity of a lifetime, the Nigerian people are resolute on uprooting, pulling down, and finally committing to mother earth, that behemoth called the PDP, that pride-infested gang of power-merchants who chant power to the people but trade it amongst themselves, and that hegemonic rule of the prodigals who have held the Nigerian State by the jugular in the last 16years. This is a referendum for the final liberation of a country potentially built to be a giant, but whose dwarf leaders have reduced her to nothing, forcing her to operate from their height.
This election will so finish people who prior to this time, were really
nothing, save for the façade they abundantly carried around. Many
husband and wife who all along had paraded themselves as Civil rights
activists and defenders of the helpless, but whose own mortal
helplessness in the face of staggeringly filthy lucre has so far been
exposed, would be so forgotten that they may not even be able to
galvanise ordinary primary school students for their usual foreign-donor
sponsored rallies. Many actors and actresses, artists and other members
of a self-glorified “Nolly & wood”, who must have all this while,
deceived themselves that they had fans and followers whose opinion they
could mould, would be so cast into oblivion, that it would appear as if
they were never known. Many media houses, who for the loose cash of the
moment decided to become a kaakaki of evil-mongering and journalistic
disgrace, may end up not been able to rise from abyss where they will be
put. Many ethnic jingoist and their feudal godfathers who had sank
billions into an empty and dirty campaign cum promotion, for the return
of a leader, whose incompetence is known both home and abroad, all
because of promissory notes of stinking contracts to come, may not be
able to recover from the shame, grief and bankruptcy that may eventually
follow their failed investment. Many, who on the basis of free dollars,
shared rice and chickens not worth more than pigeons, decided to shut
their brain to the truth, but rather willingly chose to lose their
sanity and exchange all that they have laboured for, for a pot of
porridge, may not even be able to regain the ashes, courtesy of the
shock that is bound to follow from the inferno of defeat.
In the words of the Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka he clearly figured it out when he said, "Only four sets of people can vote and support Goodluck Jonathan in 2015. These ones he classified as those who are intellectually blind, those who are blinded by ethnicity, those who are blinded by corruption and therefore afraid of the unknown should power change hands, those who are suffering from a combination of all the above terminal sicknesses". Sir, I do not agree less. These same classification were the same manifestation that heralded the 1979 Presidential Elections. As at that time, all men of good conscience and right-thinking knew that Alhaji Shehu Shagari was not in any way a match for Chief Obafemi Awolowo, but in a characteristic manifestations of the above behavioural pattern, those who should know decided to shut-down their brain, ignore the truth and preferred to choose a man who was just content with being a Senator, over a man who had for years prepared for the Presidency and a man who had matched that same aspiration with some of the finest governmental policies at the regional level. Eventually, Shagari just like the power-brokers had wanted, ended up becoming a house-boy President, being tossed to and fro, while those who propped him up continued to pilfer Nigeria to ruins. Anyway, you all know the rest of the story. But then, things have changed. If Awolowo only had his regional powerbase of the Western region sprinkled with a little bit of support here and there then, the situation today is staggeringly different. The powerbase of today’s Buhari in both the core North and the Southwest, is in itself frightening. That is not to even bring into the equation, the blinding resentment and rejection in the land, of a government that has in the last 6years disgraced Nigeria much more than she has been in totality, disgraced since independence.
If the PDP likes, it can continue to place multi-million naira advertisements of its own self-prepared projected poll survey in the front of all national dailies, so as to continue to fool itself and its few gullible followers captured by Wole Soyinka in his classification above, but then we must tell them the truth, that one truth that will happen on Saturday March 28, and that one truth that we know is their worst nightmare. This referendum is gone out of their hands, it is not only lost, it was lost a long time ago and it is a staggering loss. I like Prof.Akin Oyebode’s brilliant political thesis on what will happen on Saturday. In his brilliant submission, he averred that for anyone to win Nigeria’s Presidency, such must win convincingly in the four (4) major geo-political zones of the country. Anything apart from this, is nothing but one chance. Sir, how good of you to hit the nail exactly on its head. Let no one be deceived, that is the equation, that is the only equation that exist and this same equation will I further clothe with deep analysis in the succeeding lines. For one, Buhari’s current powerbase is not a matter up for debate and the regions in question are no other but the geo-political zones of the North-west, North-east, North-central and the South-west. This is even a fact long before now settled, at least from the records. If the PDP cares, it can go check this record when it wakes up from its slumber, but let us give them a tip of the looming tsunami sure to hit them.
When in 2011 the General ran on the platform of a ragtag party called the CPC, without as much as a single councilor, he had a whopping 12million votes largely from the North-west, North-east and the North-central geopolitical zones, all just on his popularity, integrity and person alone, how much more now. Except in the PDP’s dreams, I wait to see how Jonathan will defeat Buhari in the Southwest, particularly in Lagos, Ogun, Oyo and Osun which has the highest votes in the region. Even Ondo and Ekiti that they still dream of is gone. Both fell the day that Area-boy Governor ascended power in Ekiti, and the moment Mimiko defected to PDP and kick-started the polarization of whatever was left of the party in that state. Let me now move to the North-central. For the wise-thinking, only a government happily self-destructing from within will lose a political powerbase like Saraki’s Kwara to the APC. Nassarawa state is a no go area and with the power of gubernatorial incumbency gone in Taraba, Benue and Niger state, it is laughable how Jonathan hopes to win majority votes in that region. This truth was even revealed in the last Senatorial bye-election held a few months back in Niger state, where even with all of the posturing of Babangida Aliyu the Governor, the PDP candidate could not win at the first ballot. Next on the line is the North-east zone and one cannot but laugh. The states with the highest votes in that region i.e. Borno and Yobe are under the firm grip of the APC, while the likes of Jigawa, Bauchi, Gombe and Adamawa are nothing but pseudo-APC States, in the sense that while they appear PDP in their Governors, they are APC in the people. After all, all of these were PDP states in 2011 when the same Buhari defeated Jonathan roundly, carting away massive votes from those states.
I do not think there is any point considering the North-west region. This is the region with the highest votes in the land, so much so that its votes is far more that the entire votes of the South-south and South-east put together, and this is a region in the firm grip of the APC and is a region that has displayed the same voting pattern over the years. These are the core Fulani states with the likes of Kano, Katsina, Sokoto and Zamfara. There may not be much to say about the Southern region, but let me say that even the South-south and South-east, which the PDP prides as its base would be heavily contested. With the APC’s control in Edo, Imo and Rivers state, and the massive inroads made in Akwa-Ibom, Delta and Anambra, more reverberations are expected in that region.
Need one say more? It is evident that these true facts are very much plain before the PDP, hence their unending retinue of errors, in-house ruins and ghastly maneuvres, all powered by puerile and outdated tactics. So bad has the ghastly moves and desperate sinking-low become, that a foreign leader, I mean a President Obama even had to give a State speech to teach us on how to behave. Shame! Shame!! Shame!!! Will that day ever come when Americans, all because their elections is upcoming, will be reduced to the level where a Nigerian President would address them on how to behave? Again, the more reason why CHANGE is here. Never again shall we as a people be so reduced to a little next to nothing, so treated as kindergartens incapable who doing the right thing, and so talked down on by foreign leaders like toddlers, all because those who are supposed to be in charge are so incompetent that the incompetence has become sickening. This we have said before, and this we will say again, let the house rat inform the bush rat, that even if General Buhari is deaf and dumb, even if General Buhari is confined to the wheel chair and even if General Buhari is a stark illiterate bearing an ordinary NEPA bill, he remains a better option that a PhD wielding but mediocrity-studded Goodluck Jonathan walking on two legs, and for millions of us Nigerians, the revered General from Daura, come rain come shine has our vote.#FEBUHARI, #MARCHFORBUHARI, #MARCHBEHINDBUHARI.
Olusola Adegbite,Esq. is a Lecturer in the Faculty of Law, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, NIGERIA.
Olusola Adegbite,Esq.
Faculty of Law,
Obafemi Awolowo University,
Ile-Ife,
NIGERIA.
In the words of the Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka he clearly figured it out when he said, "Only four sets of people can vote and support Goodluck Jonathan in 2015. These ones he classified as those who are intellectually blind, those who are blinded by ethnicity, those who are blinded by corruption and therefore afraid of the unknown should power change hands, those who are suffering from a combination of all the above terminal sicknesses". Sir, I do not agree less. These same classification were the same manifestation that heralded the 1979 Presidential Elections. As at that time, all men of good conscience and right-thinking knew that Alhaji Shehu Shagari was not in any way a match for Chief Obafemi Awolowo, but in a characteristic manifestations of the above behavioural pattern, those who should know decided to shut-down their brain, ignore the truth and preferred to choose a man who was just content with being a Senator, over a man who had for years prepared for the Presidency and a man who had matched that same aspiration with some of the finest governmental policies at the regional level. Eventually, Shagari just like the power-brokers had wanted, ended up becoming a house-boy President, being tossed to and fro, while those who propped him up continued to pilfer Nigeria to ruins. Anyway, you all know the rest of the story. But then, things have changed. If Awolowo only had his regional powerbase of the Western region sprinkled with a little bit of support here and there then, the situation today is staggeringly different. The powerbase of today’s Buhari in both the core North and the Southwest, is in itself frightening. That is not to even bring into the equation, the blinding resentment and rejection in the land, of a government that has in the last 6years disgraced Nigeria much more than she has been in totality, disgraced since independence.
If the PDP likes, it can continue to place multi-million naira advertisements of its own self-prepared projected poll survey in the front of all national dailies, so as to continue to fool itself and its few gullible followers captured by Wole Soyinka in his classification above, but then we must tell them the truth, that one truth that will happen on Saturday March 28, and that one truth that we know is their worst nightmare. This referendum is gone out of their hands, it is not only lost, it was lost a long time ago and it is a staggering loss. I like Prof.Akin Oyebode’s brilliant political thesis on what will happen on Saturday. In his brilliant submission, he averred that for anyone to win Nigeria’s Presidency, such must win convincingly in the four (4) major geo-political zones of the country. Anything apart from this, is nothing but one chance. Sir, how good of you to hit the nail exactly on its head. Let no one be deceived, that is the equation, that is the only equation that exist and this same equation will I further clothe with deep analysis in the succeeding lines. For one, Buhari’s current powerbase is not a matter up for debate and the regions in question are no other but the geo-political zones of the North-west, North-east, North-central and the South-west. This is even a fact long before now settled, at least from the records. If the PDP cares, it can go check this record when it wakes up from its slumber, but let us give them a tip of the looming tsunami sure to hit them.
When in 2011 the General ran on the platform of a ragtag party called the CPC, without as much as a single councilor, he had a whopping 12million votes largely from the North-west, North-east and the North-central geopolitical zones, all just on his popularity, integrity and person alone, how much more now. Except in the PDP’s dreams, I wait to see how Jonathan will defeat Buhari in the Southwest, particularly in Lagos, Ogun, Oyo and Osun which has the highest votes in the region. Even Ondo and Ekiti that they still dream of is gone. Both fell the day that Area-boy Governor ascended power in Ekiti, and the moment Mimiko defected to PDP and kick-started the polarization of whatever was left of the party in that state. Let me now move to the North-central. For the wise-thinking, only a government happily self-destructing from within will lose a political powerbase like Saraki’s Kwara to the APC. Nassarawa state is a no go area and with the power of gubernatorial incumbency gone in Taraba, Benue and Niger state, it is laughable how Jonathan hopes to win majority votes in that region. This truth was even revealed in the last Senatorial bye-election held a few months back in Niger state, where even with all of the posturing of Babangida Aliyu the Governor, the PDP candidate could not win at the first ballot. Next on the line is the North-east zone and one cannot but laugh. The states with the highest votes in that region i.e. Borno and Yobe are under the firm grip of the APC, while the likes of Jigawa, Bauchi, Gombe and Adamawa are nothing but pseudo-APC States, in the sense that while they appear PDP in their Governors, they are APC in the people. After all, all of these were PDP states in 2011 when the same Buhari defeated Jonathan roundly, carting away massive votes from those states.
I do not think there is any point considering the North-west region. This is the region with the highest votes in the land, so much so that its votes is far more that the entire votes of the South-south and South-east put together, and this is a region in the firm grip of the APC and is a region that has displayed the same voting pattern over the years. These are the core Fulani states with the likes of Kano, Katsina, Sokoto and Zamfara. There may not be much to say about the Southern region, but let me say that even the South-south and South-east, which the PDP prides as its base would be heavily contested. With the APC’s control in Edo, Imo and Rivers state, and the massive inroads made in Akwa-Ibom, Delta and Anambra, more reverberations are expected in that region.
Need one say more? It is evident that these true facts are very much plain before the PDP, hence their unending retinue of errors, in-house ruins and ghastly maneuvres, all powered by puerile and outdated tactics. So bad has the ghastly moves and desperate sinking-low become, that a foreign leader, I mean a President Obama even had to give a State speech to teach us on how to behave. Shame! Shame!! Shame!!! Will that day ever come when Americans, all because their elections is upcoming, will be reduced to the level where a Nigerian President would address them on how to behave? Again, the more reason why CHANGE is here. Never again shall we as a people be so reduced to a little next to nothing, so treated as kindergartens incapable who doing the right thing, and so talked down on by foreign leaders like toddlers, all because those who are supposed to be in charge are so incompetent that the incompetence has become sickening. This we have said before, and this we will say again, let the house rat inform the bush rat, that even if General Buhari is deaf and dumb, even if General Buhari is confined to the wheel chair and even if General Buhari is a stark illiterate bearing an ordinary NEPA bill, he remains a better option that a PhD wielding but mediocrity-studded Goodluck Jonathan walking on two legs, and for millions of us Nigerians, the revered General from Daura, come rain come shine has our vote.#FEBUHARI, #MARCHFORBUHARI, #MARCHBEHINDBUHARI.
Olusola Adegbite,Esq. is a Lecturer in the Faculty of Law, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, NIGERIA.
Olusola Adegbite,Esq.
Faculty of Law,
Obafemi Awolowo University,
Ile-Ife,
NIGERIA.
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