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Wumione@AOL.com New York, NY, USA

"NO CONDITION IS PERMANENT"
A LOOKBACK INTO PDP's LANDSLIDE VICTORY IN AWOLOWO COUNTRY AND THE PEOPLE WHO HAD MADE IT HAPPEN

s far as I am concerned the 2003 Election taken together is a done deal. The only person that could stop Obasanjo from being sworn in as President for the third time in 25 years is Papa God Himself. I am saying so because I know that tomorrow is not promised to any of us. In a split second, something totally unexpected could happen, and Nigeria would never be the same again just like America had found out on September eleven, 2001. I can guarantee you, however that a coup is not likely, and if it does happen, forget it, we would begin to sing our "Nunc Dimitis" as a nation. My hypothesis is that the 2003 elections taken together have already become embedded in our history and historians can no longer afford to trivialize or ignore it.

This article is another attempt to join in the ongoing debate on those Elections. What you are reading here is the analysis of a diehard believer in Awo and the old Action Group, who has finally come to terms with the fact that Awo is gone, and that we must stop using the wisdom of yesterday to solve the problems of today. I have argued in the past that Obasanjo and the PDP are the best choices Nigeria has in this Election, considering the other alternatives we have, and the strange way elections are won or lost in our country. I am therefore not going to repeat myself on that. When a young child stumbles and falls, he or she looks in front of him. When a matured and wise adult stumbles, he looks back to find out what has caused his fall. What I am doing here is essentially looking back on why a northerner dominated Party the Yorubas have spent much of the last fifty years rejecting, has today become the corner stone of our Politics from Ikole to Lagos and from coast to coast.

The losers who are wasting their time and money going round most of the world capitals canvassing for annulment of the Nigerian Elections, probably have not thought through the legal implications and ramifications of what they are doing. Nigeria had fought for Independence with our blood and sweat just to make such a trip totally unnecessary. Buhari and his cohorts may therefore be living in the past by taking that step in their desperation to turn back the hand of the clock again. Obafemi Awolowo in 1964 or 1979, did not utter half the statement credited, this time around, to Buhari and his cohorts before he was charged for treasonable felony and sent to jail for years in the aftermath of the 1964 Elections which were more openly and blatantly rigged in my judgment. It will be recalled there was immediate mayhem never before witnessed in our country unlike anything we have witnessed in this election.

The same scenario was repeated in 1983 when we first introduced the American oriented Presidential system. The same thing has just been reenacted again in 2003, this time with some finesse and decorum never before witnessed in our country. The 2003 Election like the 1993 Election of Abiola were relatively speaking, the most peaceful in our history. True that a good number of people were killed in this election, but it was nothing to compare with the 1964 carnage in the old West in particular.

What Buhari is doing today is further proof to convince the whole country that Buhari either does not understand the full meaning of a constitutional Government, or does not respect it. His life after his retirement by IBB is replete with intransigence He had completely refused to appear before the Oputa Panel the other time, and he is again telling the nation now he does not recognize the Election Tribunals of a country he wants to rule. Here was a man who has had the effrontery to overthrow a democratically elected Government of Shehu Shagari, now asking for our votes as the new Democrat. If you believe that Buhari is a democrat, you will believe it if I tell you that Idi Amin was the greatest democrat that ever ruled Uganda..

The presidency of a country is not something you can stumble or gatecrashed into like Buhari was attempting to do, because he sees himself as a sacred cow from Daura. True, he is a blue blood Fulani man, but he is certainly not Uthman Dan Fodio, a man of great knowledge, wisdom and charisma that our whole nation has come to acknowledge and respect. Awolowo had devoted a life time trying unsuccessfully to be President of Nigeria. Abiola had taken more than ten years of hard work and careful strategic planning to reach the Olympian heights he had reached in 1993. Obasanjo had done the same thing. But Buhari had wanted to accomplish in six months what other more seasoned Nigerian politicians could not do in so many years.

If Buhari was particularly matured and ready for prime time, he could never have suggested that Muslims should only vote for Muslims. He had shot himself in the mouth the day he had made that silly statement. By that simple statement, he should have realized he could never have won an election to be President of a secular state like Nigeria. Who was going to vote for a man like that in any part of the South, and even in the middle Belt in this time and age?

It was therefore self serving and preposterous for Buhari to suggest he would have won if the Elections were not rigged. He was not complaining about the areas in the North where he and his Party had won convincingly. Elections were only rigged, according to him in places where his Party had not won at all. What a logic? How could he have won in places like the South/South and the South East and South West? The South East , is predominantly catholic. The South/South is a mixture of Catholics Methodists, Anglicans, Equa Ibo, Presbyterians and so many other denominations including the new evangelicals. It is only in the South West where Buhari could possibly have gotten a few votes probably from Hausa Muslims that think like him. The Muslims in the South West are the most liberated in the whole world. They are never going to give their votes to Buhari because they are sure he cannot win.

I can tell you one of the most powerful Chief Imams ever to emerge in Nigeria is a 90 year old Alhaji Yayi Akorede, the Chief Imam of Akure in Ondo State. Alhaji Yayi would never asked Muslims in Akure to support any politician, based on his religion. Never. In the South West, Muslims and Christians alike always join hands in celebrating the birth of Prophet Mohammed and the birth of Jesus Christ without discrimination, or any fear that such a harmony could keep either of them from going to Paradise or "Allujannah". My point is that there is no way Buhari would have won in the South or in much of the Middle Belt. Not even in Southern Zaria for sure. I am therefore surprised the man would be sending emissaries around the world, pleading the whole exercise to be canceled. It is an exercise in futility.

We are all waiting to receive those emissaries if they ever have the courage to show up any where in the United States, and more so in the melting port of New York City. They have got questions, and we in New York have got answers for them. My candid advice would be for them to stay home and not waste their time, and my advice to Buhari is why waste additional money paying for estacodes, flight and hotel tickets for emissaries who know upfront, that their only interest in coming, is to further feed fat on your resources, and to prolong your frustration. They probably want to seize the opportunity, at your Party's expense to go to Europe and America for shopping. That is all they are coming to do. America and Britain, Russia and China have all been adequately briefed about the elections by their ambassadors in Nigeria.

The "who is who" in world Politics are all getting ready to send their delegations to represent them at the inauguration coming up by the end of the month. Nelson Mandela the most prominent African statesman, and Her Majesty, the Queen of England are all on board on this. Who then are your emissaries going abroad to meet and to persuade? Couldn't you just learn something from Awolowo, and take your case to the Tribunal for whatever it may be worth. Try to be a more responsible loser. You should concentrate on fence-mending, to whitewash your battered image with the voters of Nigeria. That is your best choice, if you still nurse the hope of ever running for President again, because you are still young. I am not one to say never again because I appreciate a rejection in one election may not be a rejection for life, as you can see from the landslide victory of Obasanjo in the South West in the present Election. It was "Bako Daya" all the way for Obasanjo in the West in 1999. It is a different ball game this year..

How has the PDP suddenly become the Party of choice in Awolowo country? That is the question I fully intend to answer in the remaining part of this article.

The PDP capturing the whole of the South West minus Lagos which was only lost by a whisker, was more than a storm in a tea cup. It was an earthquake. But it was an earthquake that that had been getting ready to erupt since 1964 or earlier. It was an earthquake that had taken so long to finally explode bringing out so much lava of surprise and shock to many in our country who could not read between lines. Among them are those who did not pay any mind to the advice offered to Nigeria many years ago by no less a juggernaut than the great Zik himself who had said that "no condition is permanent." The same Okadigbo who I guess, is likely to be one of those emissaries going abroad for Buhari, was the same person who had blasted Zik in 1979, calling his advice "the ranting of an ant" I would have to leave you the readers to go decide for yourself who the real useless ant is today, between the late Zik and Chuba Okadigbo who says he is now ready to go to jail, if he would not be allowed to be Vice President of Nigeria..

I can now truly appreciate that the words of our elders are words of wisdom. The great Zik had gotten so offended that he had openly placed a curse on Okadigbo both in Igbo and English Language, telling him he would see the promised land of Nigerian politics from a distance, and only from a distance, but would never get there. That is exactly what is happening to Chuba Okadigbo, but the worst is yet to come. Buhari by selecting Chuba as his running mate has, by extension, taken his own share out of the curse by the man the Yoruba NCNC members in those used to eulogize as "AISIKI IWE" because Zik was truly a learned man unlike the arrogant Chuba Okadigbo. According to Zik, Chuba Wilberforce Okadigbo Oyi Oyi would be going from one horrendous mistake to another till he reaches the plateau of his political career, and would simply dissipate and fade away. That was Zik talking, not me. I am only reporting what the great Zik had said.

I am afraid Chuba and his partner in the marriage of convenience are on their way to proving Zik exactly right. As I have written before in one my articles on the shot gun marriage between Buhari and Chuba Okadigbo, I could say it again for emphasis. Their marriage is the proverbial marriage between "Olokose" and Omude, as defined in Akure folklore. The bird named "olokose" is a very beautiful male. His wife named "Omude" is a paragon of beauty. But the couple have one insurmountable problem. They are never going to be able to consummate their marriage or be fruitful enough to keep their lineage going. Why? Because "olokose" the husband does not mate or copulate in the day time, and his wife "omude" does not mate at night. What time is left is left for them to do what normal husbands and wife do? Okadigbo is too much brain and Buhari is too much brawn.

Buhari is Olokose and Okadigbo is Omude. Both of them working together to lead Nigeria is like two irreconcilable politicians working together to ruin a nation. One is clever by half, the other is a simpleton. Both of them do not share the same fundamental doctrine in their convictions. They both now claim to be democrats but we know who they truly are. I guess the only reason they are in the relationship is the aftermath of Zik's curse which is irrevocable because the great Zik is dead, and the key to removing the curse is lying some where on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean. I therefore submit that Buhari and Okadigbo did not win the last elections and could never have won.

The PDP winning in 2003 in some parts of the North, and in the South/South and the South East is no news at all, because all those places have been PDP stronghold for years. The only problem is that nobody talks about it. If you go back to the 1999 Election or Selection which Obasanjo and the PDP had won by a wide margin, even without campaigning or promising anything which is only possible in what I have described as the "Nigerian State of Mind." Obasanjo's battles were fought for him in 1999 by IBB and the millionaire Generals who spent all the money to crown him King. But Obasanjo and the PDP winning in the South West and in Ondo and Ekiti States in particular, is better described in Igbo as "Akuko."

The South West as the undisputed Awolowo country is now a smoking mirror at best. All that presumption is now history as the jinx has been broken once and for all. Gone are those days when a pig dressed in the cloak of Awolowo would win a seat in the Ondo State House of Assembly without lifting a finger I knew it was coming, but it went far beyond my expectation in the way and manner it had come, and the myths that were shattered in the process. How did it happen?

I have tried to have some reflection on the PDP's victory, and how it has all come about. In doing so, I wish to identify and pay tribute to the engineers and architects that had made it possible, and how history is going to be kinder to them, from now on as rational people contemplate how much deprivation they have had to endure in working for this victory that took so long to come..

Some of those engineers and architects had to endure blackmail and abuse for a long, long time. Some were even forced to make the supreme sacrifice by laying down their lives and irredeemably damaging their political career and reputation just to see this long dream become a reality. My father and I were part of those who had done everything in our power to shoot arrows at all those who had dared to suggest that the Yorubas as a group must not totally close our minds to those suggesting a possible realignment of forces that may lead to some Yorubas teaming up with a Northerner dominated Party like the Northern Peoples Congress (NPC) which is the same party that has, now metamorphosed into the NPN or NRC at one point, and now to PDP (Peoples Democratic Party) of today The old Action Group which also became UPN and now AD could possibly have aligned with the old NPC or the old NPN, just like the defunct NCNC or the NPP under Nnamdi Azikiwe, had always done, every time Nigeria appeared to reach a cross road in our Politics.

Many of us including me as a young graduate at Ife in the 60s, would not hear of it out of too much blind loyalty to Awolowo who could not do wrong in the world in which we had found ourselves at the time. Secondly we had thought the NPC as a Party was a feudalistic party and that the Hausas and the Fulanis were no less than human. and that any Yoruba man hobnobbing with them had to be seen as a saboteur or a traitor who must be shunned like poison. The only image of the Northerners I had as a young boy growing up in Akure is that of the beggars, little boys leading their blind mother or father holding on to the cane as they go around town, begging for alms and singing "Sadaka sabo da Allah" It took time for me to know and realize that there was more to the North than the stereotypes we often used in judging them in the old West.

There are great and decent people among the Hausas and the Fulanis. The first time I ever visited the Palace of the Sultan of Sokoto and the Palace of the Emir of Kano or the palace of the Shehu of Bornu, as Secretary to the Nigerian National Council on Education, I just couldn't believe my eyes. What I saw was Royalty at its best. I never believed that the Hausa or Fulani or Kanuri man was capable of the kind of decency I saw in some of the places I was privileged to know and to visit. It was simply unbelievable.

As a matter of fact, some of us including myself used to take pride in a statement once credited to Awo our leader, rightly or wrongly, that he would rather prefer to die than to kowtow or be led by an Hausa man. The great Awo, as far as I know, had never, at any time, admitted he ever made such a politically incorrect statement till he died. But many people had believed he did, and the rest of us had allowed such sentiments or prejudice to drive or dictate the way we view the North. Many of us, had believed that Awo probably did make such a statement, and we thought it was a most heroic thing to do at the time, not knowing that a very good politician with eyes on the leadership of a country would be suicidal or delusional to make that kind of statement. Good politics is all about tolerance, and building bridges and not erecting immovable walls. It was true the North as at then constituted, was clearly not as educational ready as the South. But Democracy which we have embraced, is all a game of numbers predicated on one man one vote. So it doesn't matter if a voter is educated or not, he has as much power as the educated and civilized man, because each of them has but only one vote when it comes to Election time. some of us actually believed in rigging elections because the "one man one vote" parlance was considered "infra dignitate" to our Nigerian State of mind.

I think because Nnamdi Azikiwe was born and raised in Zungeru in the North, he probably had a better understanding of the North than probably Awolowo from the "get go." By the same token S. L. A. Akintola as an Ogbomosho man with early roots in Jos and other northern cities, just like the late Uncle Bola Ige, also had a better understanding of the North and his people than the rest of us in Yoruba land. The NCNC which is the major party of Ndigbos would appear to understand the Hausa/Fulani better than the Yorubas, and they took full advantage of that knowledge and political awareness by their willingness to accept the North much more readily. I have to believe that the acceptance had paid off very well for the Igbos. By 1966 when the first coup first occurred, the Igbos, taking advantage of their partnership with the North, had virtually dominated most of the federal jobs that the northerners themselves could not fill, because they just did not have the education requirement or the qualifications. to compete with the Igbos.

Even though the Yorubas who are equally as educated as the Igbos, could conceivably have taken much of those positions, they just couldn't do it, because the Action Group only controlled the Western Region. The Igbos like the Jews never forget their kith and kin. If they had a choice in choosing anyone to fill a vacancy eight or nine chances out of ten, they would go for their own kith and kin, and you can hardly blame fhem. Akintola used to make a satire out of these observations in Yoruba by twisting Igbo names like Ikejiani, and Iketa-ani and by asking what then is the Yorubas going to have, if we let the Igbos take everything. If working with the Hausa oligarchy is the only way to make that happen, so be it.

That was the situation that Samuel Ladoke Akintola as Deputy to Awolowo first saw, and wanted to do something about. Unfortunately, he had gone about it in a way that suggested his betrayal of Awolowo when it first started. In the process the majority of the Yorubas had sided with Awo, and had completely demonized Akintola for daring to suggest there could be another way to the route Awolowo had charted for the Yorubas.

The infighting had gotten so bad that it totally polarized or fragmented our people into two groups, i.e., those for Awo and those for Akintola. That was the situation we were in, when Awo was jailed, and Akintola with support from the old NPC had attempted to rig the 1964 Elections in a desperate attempt to retain power by force. It was during that time that the few that supported Akintola in the West had found themselves forming a coalition Government in what had become the first Government of National unity in Nigeria with the NPC as the senior partner, while the Igbos were in it as a junior partner, and the Yorubas also in it because Akintola who spoke Hausa better than the average Hausa man and whose Democratic Party (Demo) had also become an ally of the North. That was the time Richard Akinjide had found himself becoming Federal Minister of Education, and finding some ways to open the doors of opportunity for us.

The Party that had therefore laid the foundation of the landslide victory we have all witnessed in the South West on April 12th, 19th and May 3rd, if the truth must be told was the Democratic Party led by the Samuel Ladoke Akintola. He and his group were the first to see the need for this major realignment in Nigeria For daring to speak or do something about it, Akintola himself had paid a heavy price. Richard Osuolale. Akinjide in particular was a lion, and one of the greatest children of Oduduwa without any question. Those who had branded Akintola a traitor to the Yoruba cause, may now have to think again. Trying to convince "Kiniun Onibudo" himself. which is Awolowo to develop an alternate strategy to protect the Yorubas was a Herculean task at the time. The two leaders had their points. They all meant well for the Yorubas, but one was totally misunderstood, and the other was too much revered for anyone to second-guess any decision he had made.

That was the problem. I know I am treading on very dangerous ground by making this statement at this point in time. It is an idea whose time has come, and the debate must be put on the table for all to see. At a time the widow of Obafemi Awolowo herself and one of the closest and bosom friend of Awolowo, Archdeacon Alayande my old Principal are now pitching their tent, or openly giving the nod to the PDP in preference to AD, I think it is about time to tear the mask. Even the late uncle Bola Ige had something up his sleeve when himself and Obasanjo had sponsored a counter force to the old Afenifere, in the Yoruba Congress of Elders. I think the mask was finally torn in the last Election in the South West

So the trophy for the PDP's landslide victory in the South West rightly belong to Chief Samuel Oladoke Akintola whose vision had finally caught up with our people at long last. But he was not alone. There were many other people and situations that must be acknowledged in this article.

Yakubu Gowon finally admitting that Awolowo's imprisonment was a major set back to our country, and his having the courage to release and to offer him the highest civilian position the nation could offer was part of the reason, a northerner dominated party like the PDP could start having some traction in the South West. From that point on, the Yorubas as a group had begun to feel the North was probably not as terrible as we had been made to believe. The North had reemphasized the same principle when it finally let go of its old prejudice against Brigadier Ogundipe and finally allowed Obasanjo to succeed Murtala Mohammed, albeit, in a quid pro quo arrangement, that was necessary to reassure the North. That was another water shed. The other milestone was laid by Shehu Shagari the best of our surviving leaders from the North who had demonstrated flawless and selfless leadership when he had awarded the highest honor in our country to the same Awolowo who had been a major thorn in his flesh in the 1979 Election. He did not have to do it, but he did it, anyway recognizing the place of Awolowo in the history of our country. By that singular gesture Shagari had proved to the world and to the Yorubas at large we could actually do business with the North, and trying a party dominated by them, for a change, was not such a bad idea, after all.

Abdul salam Abubakar's Government may have been implicated in the death of Abiola, the presumed winner of the June 12th, 1993 election, but he did something that the Yorubas would never forget. He and who ever is advising him knew that the Yorubas were terribly wronged by the callous manner the June 12th, 1993 Election of M.K.O. Abiola was wickedly annulled by IBB and his faceless advisers from the North and the South East. The North knew they were wrong to do that, and they knew that the Yorubas were a major factor that cannot be wished away or discountenanced in the Nigerian Equation. That was their reason for going for the Houdini of Nigerian Politics to come lead Nigeria, one more time just to appease the Yorubas.

Like I said before, Obasanjo was the first politician in Nigeria to be brought out of prison to come assume the total leadership of the country without promising anything to the Electorates, and without having to submit a manifesto he could run on. It was true that the first Osagyefo in Africa, Kwameh Nkrumah did enjoy a similar privilege in Ghana but the Ghanaians knew where he stood before he was jailed by the colonial masters. But not with the second Osagyefo ,Obasanjo who had the leadership of Nigeria delivered to him in 1999 again, on a platter of gold, without lifting a finger. So those of us who keep saying that Obasanjo has not performed and must not be reelected, therefore are totally deluding ourselves.

The man was picked to be a bridge, and he truly has been a bridge. The man was "selected" to keep Nigeria one, the last time I checked, Nigeria is still one. Who says Obasanjo has not performed? He has in a big way. That was why he had to win big, and he has. If the man was elected to do what leaders in Europe and America are elected to do, Unemployment would not be in double digits. Inflation would not be hitting the roof. He would not have doubled the price of fuel and daring to introduce another increase before his inauguration on May 29th. The value of the Naira would not have depreciated to double what it was under the professor Emeritus Sani Abacha. University Education would not have become an illusion. Obasanjo had done what he had to do by breaking the jinx of succession in our country. Perhaps for the second time in our long history, a civilian Government is handling over to another civilian outfit in our country in relative peace and harmony. It is in 2007 that you and I will have to ask or try to judge Obasanjo's performance by European and American standard. He has now promised he is going to address all the problems I have highlighted here, and we can now hold him accountable, if he fails to deliver in 2007.

There were other intangible situations that make the official North to want to respect or even secretly admire the South West. Sardauna Bello used to complain about Awolowo forcing him out to go on the Campaign trail to start canvassing for votes. That was because Awo had given him a challenge he had never expected, given his noble birth and life of privilege. The plan for the North to finally do something about Education for the Talakawas in the North was forced on the North by the Awolowo success story in giving free education and free medical health to all children below the age of 18 in the West.

The North has appreciated the South West more than it has appreciated the South East because of the personality and the achievements of Awolowo in the West and for the l time he had served as Federal Commissioner for Finance and Deputy Chairman. They knew they ought to make effort to deliberately curry the favor of the West by not giving up completely on the South West. That was why they quickly embraced Akintola when he gave them a window of opportunity in 1964. They knew the West does not take nonsense. The North had quickly abandoned Omoboriowo in 1983 when Ondo State had decided to fight back. For the same reason Sani Abacha had found some ways to create Ekiti State in the hope he could appease the wild wild West and get some respite from that segment of the country.

The North had left open the door to engage in some constructive engagement with the West. The same kind of door was never left open for the Yorubas by the Igbos who saw the Yorubas as their greatest enemies and rivals. The opportunity was there all along for the Yorubas and the North to appreciate they were natural allies.

The monarchical structure of the North and the South West was another connection. The friendship between the Emir of Kano and the Oni of ife was symbolic of that. There was also the issue of Religion. Abiola had reached out to the North in many more ways than any southern politician from the South/South and the South East because he was a Muslim. Islam in the South East is an aberration. Igbo Muslims are contractors digging for Gold. In the South West, it is not so. The Yorubas are deeply entrenched in Islam, and the Folawiyos and the Arisekolas of this world are not in the faith because they are just digging for gold. They are in it, because it was part of their heritage. For that reason the late Shehu Musa Yardua with his political machine was able to defeat Olu Falae in Ibadan of all places without any rigging at all. The Yorubas and the North had a lot in common that we could tap into. All those connections had wet the ground for the landslide victory that the PDP had finally witnessed in the South West

I must not fail to talk of the efforts made by individuals in places like Ondo State, my own state in Nigeria. The moment the late Olaiya Fagbamigbe. Omoboriowo, Chief Robert Akesogie Agbayewa, late Lawyer Agunbiade the late Chief Kola Ogungbade alias (Abare a gbe) and a few others like Senator Olorunnimbe Farukanmi, Professor Sunday Agbi. Otumba Omolade Oluwateru, Mr J.B. Opedun and even our incoming Governor Olusegun Agagu had finally decided to pitch their tent with the NPN/PDP in Akure, I could tell something was coming, but I never expected it would take an earthquake like the one we saw on April 12th. These are some of the individuals to be thanked among so many others, for the landslide victory of the PDP in Awolowo country And now to the biggest fish of all.

Akika Olusegun Obasanjo was a big part of this equation from his days in the Military Academy when he realized like the late Ladoke Akintola that if you cannot beat the North, you have got to join them. I think he did his homework thoroughly and completely jettisoned the old stereotype of the Hausa/Fulani impressions many of us had been raised to believe. He had clearly shown the North he was not an Awolowo clone and was going to behave differently. He had a chance to convincingly prove that in 1979 when he made the statement "in Politics, the best candidate does not have to win" in deference to Shagari, and true to the "Nigerian State of mind" I mentioned earlier on in this write-up. He had reaped the full benefits of that stand when in 1999 Obasanjo had become the only "bridge" the North could trust in the South. It did not even matter that his own people had rejected him. He had been selected, and the Election was just working to the answer. Nobody had protested or sent any delegation to any foreign capitals to plead annulment.

I credit the PDP victory to Obasanjo and his foot soldiers and the fact that the AD Government had lost their moral compass and sanity. I rest my case.