FEATURE ARTICLE

Tuesday, July 23, 2019
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Arizona, USA
SEYI MAKINDE: WHEN IMPAIRMENT IS IMPAIRMENT!

"It is high time Nigerian voters started voting for the right persons in a wrong party instead of the wrong persons in a right or wrong party." - Yahaya Balogun
eyi Makinde is the brand new governor of Oyo State in South-western Nigeria. He is an Engineer and a subject matter expert on fluid and Gas Metering. Oluseyi Abiodun Makinde is a Nigerian Businessman, Philanthropist and Politician. Makinde's progressive baptism in Nigerian polity might eventually be a good omen for the country's political odyssey afterall! It is high time Nigerian voters started voting for the right persons in a wrong party instead of the wrong persons in a right or wrong party.

Sometimes, precisely early last year before the general elections, a Nigeria-Diasporan Professor Akinyemi in the United States asked me to support the young man-Seyi Makinde. I swung into intellectual requisite to find out who was the Seyi Makinde's new beautiful bride in this Nigerian politics. Seyi Makinde wasn't a known name in the befouled Nigerian politics, but in the rustic town of Ibadan, the young handsome Nigerian billionaire has touched many lives through his philanthropic activities in Oyo state. He's well known among the poor and pauperized people in the ramshackle towns and villages in Oyo State. Makinde's silent philanthropic support has helped a lot of people in the state.

Coincidentally, Makinde graduated from Bishop Phillips Academy, Iwo road, Ibadan the same year I finished my high school at Igbemo Community Comprehensive High School, Igbemo Ekiti, Ekiti state, Nigeria. I had the privilege of going to the same Ibadan Academy to retake my WAEC examination; a place where some of his teachers were incidentally my teachers. Seyi Makinde's interest in oil and gas is not surprising! A brilliant young mathematician who had the vision of exploits and exploration in the fields of Engineering.

"Time doesn't heal anything; it's how we deal with time that determines the speed at which we heal" - Amy Morin. It's unbelievable to read as usual on social media platforms that, the new governor is a billionaire that has come to consolidate his wealth, and make himself more money at expense of the people. If a man can pay more than 1 billion naira taxes on his businesses, his more than 40 billion naira assets declaration should be seen as uncooked declaration! It's extremely disingenuous of people with this mindset and opinionation. It's dangerous and frustrating to be normal in an abnormal society like Nigeria. The people you are trying to help in Nigeria today will be your staunch enemies tomorrow. When President Buhari declared his assets and with no single foreign account; with no magnificent landed property in Nigeria: and our folks still castigated and disbelieved him. The same thing is happening to the new Oyo state governor. It is absolutely instructive to work with the courage of our convictions and not give a hoot of what agents of destabilization say about us. Impairment is impairment! Ignorance is one of the products of idiocy! If you don't know, you don't know. Period!

When a leader allows people's dismissive opinions to affect his leadership role, the leader will fail woefully. Seyi Makinde seems smart to understand the bleak future of these folks, thus making efforts to help remove the log, impairment and cloudy political eyes of our no-all-for-nothing youths in Nigeria. In my travel experiences, I have come to realize that, we have a long way to go! Nigeria's problems are too complex and complicated.

As we collectively navigate the murky water of politics in Nigeria, may we collectively have the willingness to reorder our sense of reality and decorum. How else do explain the savagery of worshipping money at the expense of national cohesion and development? Those who are discouraging Seyi Makinde from focusing on the real governance should realize that, Seyi is an outsized leader who is well groomed in business management. A field that will effectively and effortlessly help him the business of government in Oyo state and Nigeria. He seems to have read the political bible of Cicero of Esa Oke, the late Chief Bola Ige who was brutally murdered during the inglorious regime of Mr. Tortoise!

Seyi Makinde seems to know his destination as he steers Oyo state's vehicle of governance. Yes! Too early to take a stock of his government! But that guy must succeed to reorietate the docile Nigerian youth. It's too early to conclude and score Seyi at his administration's infancy! We pray he doesn't derail from his envisioned and participatory democracy. He must avoid the inheritance of his PDP's egregious party, and take heed of the immediate past APC's maladministration in Oyo state. We hope Makinde's young administration continues with its clear-roadmap as he governs distinctively from the past corrupt manifesto of his party-PDP.

The new governor mustn't relent in his efforts to be a transformational leader who will print his name in gold in the Nigerian political history. I can smell Awo's political perfume in Seyi Makinde. The young handsome dude has opened up Awo's political template. He must use the wisdom therein to his political benefits. The wrongly partied but resourceful young billionaire seems to understand the political chemistry of Oyo people and Nigerians. Makinde is another resourceful politician to watch in the contradictory political environment in Nigeria. We pray for his success as he cruises the murky political clouds of our troubled country.

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