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The rot we’re writhing in today isn’t by accident. It has its ugly history. It’s rich in absurdities and outright oddities. The decay did not just happen to us. Not unannounced!
It couldn’t have taken us off guard. We were sufficiently warned, cautioned. We saw it coming. We can’t pretend otherwise. It was a matter of when and how.
It was a deliberate intention by our rulers to do us in. From-start-to-finish. They never perceived themselves as leaders but rulers. They came to rule, reign and ruin. And they are perfectly on spot by conceding to their own whims and caprices.
How did it start? It came at the inception of this dispensation. Almost unnoticed. That was when our institutions of checks and balances came under the heavy hammer. It was devastating. We couldn’t comprehend what informed such action.
Our rulers prey on these institutions for their greed. And feast on them ferociously with relish. They targeted the checks and balances in our strong institutions. And set their minds to destroy them to satisfy their selfishness.
The Constitution sets stringent rules for impeachment process. It has to be strict and uncompromising. None of that took place. All of that have been obeyed in the breach.
Impeachment becomes a tool to witch-hunt. It ought to be transparent. That would never happen. A governor at loggerheads with godfathers and power brokers can be removed with a fiat! Declaration of state of emergency is the new threat. It’s the Presidency’s latest potent weapon. It flaunts at will.
All the checks and balances erected in the way of impeachment have been dismantled, perverted. And substituted for greed, avarice, lust and craving. We’re left dangling, swinging dangerously back and forth. Loosely suspended in the air like a pendulum. That’s what they have made out of us today.
They are glad their deadly mission is accomplished. You can see it all over them. In their cruel actions and inactions. You can smell the stinking arrogance in their body language. Their carriage speaks volumes.
Arguably. We can safely lay a larger portion of the blame at the doorsteps of former President Olusegun Obasanjo. He started the show of shame. He used institutions to protect himself. He didn’t submit himself to checks and balances. Instead, he opted to rubbish them turning the same checks and balances against his victims.
He descended on everything that could check his overindulgence. He detested anything that would balance him up. The military man in him couldn’t curb his excessive excesses. Many times, he forgot he wasn’t wearing his starched khaki uniform any longer. He raved and roared in the Villa uncontrollably.
The exemplars are legion. And they are forever evergreen. Ex-Oyo State governor Rashidi Ladoja’s impeachment was a classical case study. Obasanjo executed it in bad blood. It was excruciatingly painful. There was no need for such a move. No rational mind would rationalise it.
Ladoja was physically impeached by a thug, the late Eleweomo. Of course, he couldn’t have done it all alone. It was with huge courtesy of the late Chief Lamidi Adedibu, the chief executioner.
Eleweomo sat on the Speaker’s seat. Live on television. He raised the gavel, slammed it on the table. And pronounced Ladoja impeached on January 12, 2006. And that became “law” instantly. Hell was let loose on the city of Ibadan.
The doggedness in Ladoja would not cave in. He refused to be rubbished. And it paid off handsomely for him. He was returned to office on December 12, 2006. The Appeal Court, Ibadan, nullified the illegal impeachment on November 1, 2006. The Supreme Court upheld this decision on November 11, 2006.
And see where it landed him: Tomorrow, September 26, 2025, he becomes the 44th Olubadan of Ibadanland! Today is his 81st birthday. Having been born on September 25, 1944. And where are his traducers? Consigned to a dirty, stinking history!
We didn’t see much of that, if any, when President Umoru Yar’Adua held sway. He even admitted glaring irregularities in the election that brought him into office. Obasanjo supervised that poll. It was conducted under his keen watch and nose.
Yar’Adua was determined to make amends. He swore he would revolutionise our electoral system the next time. He never did. He succumbed to the ultimate call of nature.
We were deprived of that revolution. But we acknowledged his sincerity. We believed what he never fulfilled. His rare sincerity still stands him tall among the whole pack.
Honestly. It’s still a task to place Goodluck Jonathan here or there. Did he make use of the opportunities Obasanjo opened up? Or did he buy into Yar’Adua’s agenda? He strived to maintain a delicate balance.
But the late President Muhammadu Buhari came, saw and conquered us. He didn’t pretend about his hideous agenda. And he pursued it with the deftness he believed it deserved. He almost collapsed the system on us.
He ensured every fabric of our society was at the breaking point. That was the mandate he self-assigned to himself. The pendulum was already in noticeable speed then. He brought us from-top-to-bottom.
He did a lot of damage to our institutions. Too numerous to attempt mentioning. Where do we start? By the time Buhari expired. None of our institutions was worthy of any worth. He effectively checkmated all the checks and unbalanced all the balances.
The ultimate happened to us on May 29, 2023. Since then, the centre just refused to hold. The Jagaban in President Bola Tinubu was restless. He couldn’t hold back. He practically jumped on us with no apologies. No remorse from his day one.
So much was expected of him. And he disappointed us so much. Even before he saw any official file. He started hitting hard at what remained of the institutions Buhari feigned to leave behind. As it stands now, the almighty Presidency towers above all. It’s uncheckable and “unbalanceable.” No institution can dare to check and/or balance it. It will devour such institution in return.
Ask the judiciary. And even the near rubber-stamp legislature. Which’s flaunting fake image of independence. It is sad how our democracy is being toyed with. Tossed like a coin to suit their insatiable appetite.
The Narrative Force, so they elect to tag themselves. They could not stomach it further. They did give a grim narrative of our predicament. Its face, Akin Samuel Kayode, did that meticulous narration.
His WhatsApp post is unputdownable. It touches all facets of our collective existence. Kayode is actually its assistant secretary. He took the Tinubu Presidency to the cleaners. And attempted to wash it of its stinking decay, rot, deceit, falsehoods, outright lies, delusion and illusion. Name it. You’re right on course!
In just 18 months. Tinubu’s presidential jets gulped a whopping N26.38 billion! His mega travels took the lion’s share of this profligacy. The gains from his frequent foreign trips are hugely disproportionate to the enormous costs. That’s just one item in the long list of Kayode’s conscientious, indefatigable narration. In doubt? Courtesy; The Punch, August 16, 2025.
You can travel for all you care. Event to the moon; to the stars; to the sun. We too care less. If you care to know. You can be airborne all the time. Better still. You can run your tenure even in the air.
But, at what huge and hurting cost? His hailers would want us to accept this hook, line and sinker. We must not interrogate it because it’s Tinubu. In whose interests? The hailers are the sole beneficiaries.
They will hail and defend anything Tinubu. His rabid pack of attack dogs are in one devilish accord. They pounce savagely upon anything they blindly perceive as anti-Tinubu. They alone know the criteria to identify such. Nobody else does.
They fling their little iota of reasoning to the marines. And throw whatever remains of their caution into the reeky gutters. Let them sink with the marines. And roll in the gutters!
Kayode couldn’t restrain himself: “A country once described as the giant of Africa, with abundant human and natural resources, now finds itself trapped in a vicious cycle of poverty, hunger and insecurity under the leadership of President Tinubu.
“What should have been a government of renewed hope has turned into a government of renewed suffering for millions of ordinary Nigerians who struggle daily to survive.” Who wants a contest with Kayode? Nobody!
All of these are and more in the public sphere. Nothing hidden. Nothing missing. Nothing broken. It is amazing and amusing the governors are falling for Tinubu’s new mode of democracy. Sad!
They’re imbibing the negative cue for the wrong reason; increasingly becoming uncheckable and “unbalanceable.” They are falling flat for lawlessness and recklessness. Pray, this madness must stop. Or a messier time will soon be. Perhaps now.
When a candidate will be so audacious to display callous effrontery. And secure endorsement for two terms at a go. Even before he starts his first tenure. A two-in-one endorsement is already in the kitty! Strange? So, you wonder! Wait! We’re getting there gradually with great speed.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing is impossible in this our eerie clime. We watch things happen with utmost bewilderment.
The very democracy Tinubu was variously credited to have upheld as a governor. The same principles he’s dismantling as President. Even with uncommon craving and appetite. Eighteen years after!
You fought Obasanjo on all fronts on democratic ethos. Your local government reforms in Lagos State were novel. A veritable template for almost all states. They bought into it without any stress. It was a revolution reverberating throughout the land.
Alas, times have changed. Old things have passed away. You are now springing up inanities as new things. See the manner you muddled up your so-called LG autonomy. It was without recourse or regard to the Constitution.
We never knew. Not in our wildest imagination. That a Tinubu could take us this down low. That he could assault democracy this worst. And sank it this deep. Tinubu could be this vicious and ferocious on democracy? And have the guts to drag it to the abattoir. This reckless manner!
This is beyond comprehension. Yoruba say: Tí wọ́n bá sọ pé omi ni yóò ṣe ẹja jínán, a sọ pé ìrò ni. It’s a proverbial way of saying: “When something impossible is claimed, we reject it as falsehood.”
That’s exactly our plight. We are utterly confused. Tinubu is running democracy this dastardly. Bashing and battering it mercilessly.
For the sake of democracy, re-examine your missteps. You have the reverse gear at your beck and call. Be genuinely discerning. Apply the same “boldness and dexterity” you’re self-famed for. And bring back sanity to our chaotic and riotous home-grown democracy.
You can halt this pendulum swing now. Let there be a replay of your much-taunted May 29, 2023, swagger.
