Nowhere else but here. Ugly, stinking history can keep occurring only in our filthy clime. What a disturbing circuit of absurdities.
As it was in the early 1980s. So it was in the late 1990s. Again in 2010. And now in 2025. Shocked? Such has been our unsettled journey. We have been having it raw and rough.
But we pray fervently it will end with us. It must not be allowed to sneak into the future. No stone will be left unturned. It won’t jeopardise our hereafter, our tomorrow.
Sweep them clean! Wipe them out. Throw them away! The cliché is not new to us. It’s not strange to our eerie political climate.
They call it defection. We call it infection. It’s fast becoming cancerous. That’s the stage we are at today. And that’s where our fears come into play.
We had a striking resemblance of this near one-party state in 2010. It was in the turbulent build-up to the 2011 elections. Former President Goodluck Jonathan was on the ballot paper.
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was on top of the game that year. It was in its best of times. It secured whopping 31 governors. Safe in its kitty, out of 36 states! That was huge, a masterstroke. It really called for serious concern. It couldn’t have come ease.
How did PDP make it so big? Just like President Bola Tinubu insisted last Wednesday. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo aligned. He didn’t see it then as Nigeria racing to one-party state.
He asserted vehemently: PDP made it through election. And not defection! And he would want us to believe. He poured out in his cocky element:
“What’s wrong with that? If the people of Nigeria decide to vote for PDP, should PDP go to them and say, please don’t vote for us?” He shot back at his interviewer.
Nigerian politicians? They changeth not. No matter their feigned difference. They will always have a common meeting point: Selfishness is it! And its accompanying cousin, shamelessness.
But, sooner than expected, PDP reached its ultimate limits. It was sudden and awful. It turned against itself and its own interests.
Something vital gave way. PDP crumbled and imploded. In a turn of events, disdain set in. The party became unattractive. A leper to its members and serial defectors.
Nigerians resisted PDP then. They not the arrogance of its haughty leaders. It served them quite right. They refused to be cheaply sacrificed. On the altar of one-party state. It was for our collective good.
Real or imagined, that agenda was truncated in 2015. We swear to high heavens. We are capable. We can make this happen one more time. It’s within our capacity. We will do it again. We will spring a repeat performance. We are able. And it will be outstanding.
It started as “mere” defection far back in 1983. But the tyranny in General Sani Abacha fostered it in 1998. He upped the game to outright adoption. It was a deadly blow to our bruised psyche.
And if Tinubu forgets anything at all. He can’t pretend ignorance of this. He’s very much aware of its details: The five political parties coerced to adopt Abacha as sole presidential candidate.
Roll call of the participating parties: Committee for National Consensus (CNC), United Nigeria People’s Convention (UNPC), National Centre Party of Nigeria (NCPN), Democratic Party of Nigeria (DPN) and Grassroots Democratic Movement (GDM).
They provided the template for the APC’s gathering last Thursday. The party must have picked “useful lessons” from the leprous fingers of 1998. APC made a good repeat performance that day.
One after the other. Alternative Intelligence (AI) bears witness: “Specifically, between April 16 and 20, 1998, all but one of the five registered parties adopted Abacha as their consensus candidate for the presidential election scheduled for August 1998.”
Chief Bola Ige was so pissed off. Disgusted, pained to the marrow. He aptly derided them: “The five fingers of a leprous hand,” which they were. The fingers wouldn’t be deterred. They were spurred by greed and avarice. And proclaimed Abacha “lord” at their various meetings.
In like manner, Tinubu demonstrated at his APC’s gathering. That was the tonic Abacha earnestly sought and got. To actualise his “priceless” mandate, he went on prowling. Searching for whom to devour.
Abacha swore to himself by his own name: His prized endorsement must become a reality in his lifetime. He turned stiff-necked, deviant, blind, dumb and deaf to good reason.
He sent out his evil and devilish agents. They occupied every nook and corner. Fifty of us were so unfortunate. We inadvertently strayed into his violent path. And crossed his red line.
We were given as prey to Abacha’s poisonous teeth. We became casualties of his inordinate ambition. We were into his gulag and tagged “prisoners of war.” And thrown into Agodi Prison, Ibadan, Oyo State.
For 30 or more excruciating days. We watched in despair and distress, Abacha’s desperate bid to transmute into a civilian president. His military cap was his potent trademark. He manipulated it to the maximum.
The leprous endorsement brought the worst out of Abacha. He practically went berserk. Nothing meaningful made sense to him anymore. Except, of course, his transmutation project.
He became increasingly riotous and chaotic to manage. His swollen head enlarged in length, breadth and depth. He was uncontrollable, unreachable and “unadvisable.” He was caged by his insane ambition.
Charlatans, tricksters, double-crossers took the fullest advantage of his seeming insanity. They swooped on him. And swarmed around him.
Theirs was a deadly clique. Coupled with a killer squad. They hacked down any suspected irritant to his devilish ambition. And silenced dissenting voices. In most cases forever.
The Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) totally yielded to him. It became the publicity and advocacy arm of his leprous electioneering. It was his strongest propaganda machine. The prime time was its 9pm “Network News,” aka Network Lies!
All you would hear and see: Abacha and his magic caps. It was appalling and nauseating. His military cap underwent transmission and transformation. It came in shape, size and colour of different shades. It was irritating to behold.
First the shape. Then the shade. It dissolved itself from military cap. Came out in an Igbo mould. Moved to a Yoruba type. And capped it in a Hausa mode. In no particular order.
It kept inter-changing to reflect the so-called federal character. Abacha’s “electioneering” was so effective. It had no rival, no alternative. It was no competition. It was no contest.
Abacha soon slipped deeper into delusion, hallucination and illusion. He was ruled and ruined by fantasies. They overtook him. They became his favourites, pastimes and watchwords.
His case became messier. He was afraid of himself and his ugly shadow: Hunted, haunted till the end of his turbulent lifetime. He was holed up inside the rocky Aso Villa, Abuja. Clearly, it was self-inflicted.
Abacha practically played God. The reason he finished his race so cheaply. Let those who have listening ears hear. Those who have eyes, see wide beyond the nose. And discern with their discerning hearts.
Tinubu once fought one-party state to the halt. He stood stoutly against Abacha on his illegitimate transmutation. He didn’t give him any breathing
space, home and abroad. He caused him endless nightmares.
Is Tinubu having the same nightmare? He is on rampage. Rattling the South like never before. Has he reached the brick wall in the North? What happened to the much-flaunted Muslim-Muslim ticket? Just two years after?
The onslaught is directed on the South. Particularly South East and South South. The reason is clear. The South West is given. It’s perceived to be safely under his ambit. The core North is practically a no-go-area.
But this Jagaban is an acclaimed master strategist. Always at his drawing board: Framing and re-framing. He’s known for springing startling surprises. At the appropriate time with absolute accuracy. He does not take a no for an answer.
Just name your price. Grab it with all the strength in you. And run with it. Nothing missing. Nothing broken. The end is the ultimate justification of the means. That’s the idea. That’s philosophy behind defection. Nothing sensible else matters.
They have taken us for a rough ride many times over. They tried former President Muhammadu Buhari on us. They swore blindly that he would end all our calamities. It was an intentional deceit. They lied deliberately. They knew he couldn’t have.
Their vow became our woes. Our afflictions jumped in bounds and leaps. Buhari’s reign reduced us to ruins. His eight years were a stupendous failure. A disaster of no known means.
They dabbled into a Muslim-Muslim ticket. They horned their propaganda machine. And recklessly unleashed it on us. We were forced to crumble. Willingly and unwillingly.
That too collapsed like a careless pack of loose cards. We were convinced that it couldn’t have held water. And it did not. It ran into troubled, stormy, violent waters.
They won’t rest until there’s no more rest. They’re having anxieties over 2027. They are clinging to the straps of raw power.
That’s why Tinubu sees nothing amiss: “There’s nothing wrong with a one-party state system.” He throws up new semantics. He cares not if our ox is gored or brutally injured. He calls it one-party ruling.
Then he moved swiftly against the ruminants of the opposition. He roared like a ravaging lion: “Sweep the dust away.”
Ah, that’s a war proclamation of sorts. That’s another fraud of big consequences. It’s one “politricks” too many. We opt to call a spade by its name.
They are obsessed with one-party system. They won’t listen to us. Just like our votes do not count. The same cruel fate has befallen our voices. Our choked voices don’t count anymore. They tag ours Babel of voices. We’re strictly on our own.
We’re snowballing. Speedily rolling into dictatorship democracy. Their ultimate destination is tyrannical “democrazy.” And they are ferociously pushing harder to get there. God forbid!
We don’t know what they want to make out of this. A four-year first term is already done deal. You barely spent two years. Your gaze is fixed on an additional four-year term!
You knowingly self-scored yourself AAA+++. Boot-lickers, do-gooders are all over us. Singing the eerie song. Stranger than fiction! Why are we this weirdly wired in this our wild clime?
Opposition parties are a complete let down. Slothful and lazy! They are not enthusiastic enough. No sign of seriousness. They are fading speedily into extinction. Are they really prepared for 2027? Are they playing to the gallery?
You can’t place them. We can’t see a meaningful opposition in their motionless body language, actions and inactions. They are not even sure of what they actually want.
No self-esteem, no self-confidence demonstrated. They are operating at cross-purposes. No synergy of any type. They’re undermining themselves, each other and one another. Tragic!
This is not how to run a formidable opposition. Not this half-heartedly. Nobody does it in that manner. And achieve positive results. You need to get your act right.
Stop blurring our vision!