A friend told me that I always take my time to respond to issues, not minding the fact that they are rife. I think that is the way of the thinker – the attitude of postponed judgment; extensive observation. Yes, that is what equips the respondent. I am aware of the trending issues about this old fellow called Gen. Olusegun Mathew Okikiola Aremu Obasanjo (hereinafter referred to as “Baba”) in the print, audiovisual, and the new media. Unlike most people, I am not astonished, considering the fact that the old kid has always longed for political, as against, economic relevance. But why are we really concerned about the piffle that emanate from the ruffled and scabrous lips of this misadventurer? What is that intrinsic perturbation that titillates and unsettles our Baba so much that he still whines like a baby that misses mama’s milk? What has this political leprechaun, one whose looks accentuates our striking semblance with apes, monkeys, and orangutan not been able to guard against making unguarded comments? And why does he pulsate with horrendous fear for the person of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and Biafra? Brothers and sisters, join me as I do a postmortem on the litany of immorality and political malfeasance that reside in this old man that grows younger as more calendars get produced.
THE MORAL AND POLITICAL DIMENSIONS OF BABA OBASANJO
Our Baba is one of the privileged few in Lugard’s gift to the North – Nigeria – to have had the happenstance to man the plum seat of the President of Nigeria twice. Baba joined the military in 1958, served in the 5th Battalion of the Nigerian Army in Kaduna and Cameroon between 1958 and 1959 and was promoted to Lieutenant in 1960. He became a Captain in 1963, was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in 1967, and then Colonel in 1969, and Brigadier General in 1972. You can see it took Baba just 14 years (1958-1972) to become a General in the Nigerian Army. He moved on to become Head of State after the failed coup by Col. Dimka, one that carried with it the assassination of Murtala Muhammed – a coup that has been said to have failed because it missed the duo of Obasanjo and Danjumah – which means our Baba has always been a very lucky man. He became Head of State by choice from 1976 to 1979, a period of Oil Boom. He was so unsettled by the truth about his misadministration that he sicced the military at Fela Kuti, leading to the murder of the latter’s mother in broad daylight in the most brutal manner, for the aged victim was thrown down a tall building. Our Baba has done very bad things, but continues to feign sainthood. Fortune chose him a second time in 1999, after the demise of Gen. Sani Abacha, and he became the Number One man in Nigeria in civvies for eight (8) years, with a failed bid to unconstitutionally extend his tenure through bribe and intimidation of the legislators. Such quest for power!
Baba’s love for power and relevance is incomparable, for he is ready to do anything, including committing incest. Baba, in the 70s, floated National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS), which enabled him to acquire Ota Farm, a farm he formally opened on October 8, 1979, a week after he handed over. During the period covering 1999 and 2007, our Baba and Atiku, his Vice, saw to it that the so-called Privatisation Scheme through Transcorp was used to milk Nigeria dry and out. Anyone that entertains a modicum of doubt as to the institutionalized political corruption that characterized Obasanjo’s government should find out how the duo engaged each other in national dailies over the embezzlement of Mofas and PTDF accounts. Of course, Transcorp was a veritable conduit pipe for both Baba and Atiku, as they used it to acquire every State property in the guise of privatization. Baba and Atiku continued to exhibit the Argumentum Ad Hominem of “You Too” or “Two Wrongs Can Make a Right” on the pages of tabloids, a shameful display, to say the least.
I am talking about a sitting President of Nigeria who could not provide paltry twenty thousand (N20,000.00) Naira in 1999 (according to Orji Uzor Kalu, the erstwhile Governor of Abia State), but who later owned a university and National Library. Our Baba has a mysterious MAGIC WAND that enabled him to acquire several companies and resuscitate his moribund Ota Farm few years after ascendancy to power. From 1999 to 2007 our Baba’s greed for power saw to the deposition of several party chairmen and Senate Presidents all of whom questioned his bigotry. I wish to state here and now that the basis for Baba’s removal of several Igbo Senate Presidents was premised on his hatred for the Igbo ethnic group. I recall how Obasanjo spent time with Audu Ogbeh, the PDP Chairman, mouthed morsels of pounded yam with him, after which the same chairman was made to tender his resignation AT GUNPOINT. That is how “friendly” Obasanjo is. Peter Odili, the Governor of Rivers State then, was his regular host, as Baba visited our state ne’er every month in expectation of Odili’s ever-ready Ghana-Must-Go bags as souvenir. Was it not this same Baba that came to our State to commission empty gas turbines? Was Baba not enjoying the young undergraduates, girls young enough to be his granddaughters that attended to his INORDINATE LIBIDO every time he visited Rivers State?
Morally speaking, our Baba made a huge mess of the matrimony of his first son, Gbenga, when in the name of Ogboni ritual rites he committed incest with his own daughter-in-law, the wife of his own son. Is that not a very horrible thing, dear readers? A sitting President could bring himself to commit such unspeakable and unimaginable abomination with gay abandon, for he felt no gumption to be remorseful about it; in lieu of admittance of wrong, Baba’s cronies came to his rescue. Gbenga, his son, was so uncontrollably infuriated by Baba’s dastardly act that he had to desert his father and Nigeria for the United States, where he plies his trade. Sometimes I wonder why Baba that does not know how to keep his home schmoozes about nationalism. How does the horrible and DISMAL PATRIARCH become the adorable STATESMAN? When will this glorified MORAL DWARF wake up from this extended slumber? When will our Baba come to terms with his irrelevance in national issues? Is the anathema (curse) from his nexus of evil deeds so strong and unbreakable? When will the aged know that it is wise to maintain golden silence on issues that are the prerogative of the ordinary masses? Who is telling our corrupt, filthy, and bigoted Baba that his opinion counts in the people’s quest for self-determinism? Baba should concentrate on mending fences with Iyabo-Bello, his aggrieved daughter whose burning anger made her respond to her father’s unguarded meddlesomeness while Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan manned Aso Rock – recall her riposte to her father’s open letter.
WHY OBASANJO HAS THIS TORMENTOUS FEAR FOR KANU AND BIAFRA
Baba knows his time of relevance in the world is drawing to a close and is working hard, including clutching to whatever straw within grabs, to survive. Baba was the one that received the surrender of Biafrans in 1970 and has since then derived immense benefit from the corruption-personified enclave referred to as Nigeria. Biafra is one word that makes our Baba quake. Of course, our ever-babyish Baba knows a Nigeria that has the West as her prey will not augur well for him and his intractable bid to remain relevant. For those in the West, the Niger Delta and South-East, an unreal partition occasioned by the collusion of the North and West after the Civil War to sustain the predatorship of the North, should continue to distract the predator from others. Yes, just as Obafemi Awolowo devised a means for the Gowon-led Nigeria to conquer the formidable and tenacious Biafrans in the 70’s, our Baba wants Nigeria to tame our hero, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu. Yes, Baba does not want to lose his oil well and criminally acquired Ota Farm. The secession of both the Igbo and the Niger Delta, both of which were together as Old Eastern region, is the fear of Baba and those of his ilk.
Brothers and sisters, I have noticed a pattern in our own Femi Fani-Kayode’s works. He is a nice man. We all love him, but there is something we must take seriously. FFK, as he is fondly called, is one person that has always seen the struggle for the restoration of Biafra as an Igbo thing. He always easternizes the struggle in his bid to keep faith with Obafemi Awolowo. It is for the same reason I have always asked our people to be wary of the West. To be candid with us all, I see the West as the more dangerous member of the unholy alliance. It is high time we all began to make it known to FFK and others that the restoration of Biafra is a project being driven by both Niger Delta and Igbo. Any attempt, deliberate or purposeful, to Igbonize the struggle must meet with stiff resistance from us all. We still love FFK, but we cannot stomach his deliberate or accidental misinterpretation of the struggle to escape the demonic and suppressive geographical enclave; a gift to the Fulani/North from Lord Lugard called Nigeria. FFK and Baba should note that this is not the 60’s and early 70’s. We are not oblivious of the nefarious activities of the North in the 40’s and 60’s when our collective peoples were the victims of well-calculated pogroms in Jos and other parts of the North. Baba should take it easy, because he lacks the capacity to halt the struggle to birth a true nation. Nigeria, we dare say, has failed to encourage the welfare of her citizens, and every attempt to correct this anomaly since 1946 has met with regional disagreement. We know that restructuring will take us through the same labyrinth of failed attempts to better our lot. We know the solution to our problem. We, the people, have the needed will to solve it once and for all. Baba should not bother himself. We love our leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, but the struggle has gone beyond any individual. He remains the reason behind this reinvigorated drive, no doubt, but what we want is good for all and sundry.
Dear old child called Baba, there is no way out of this agitation. We are not asking for war. What we want is a peaceful referendum under the supervision of the international communities where we shall prove to the world that we are tired of being coerced into an unworkable marriage called Nigeria. We understand that you and the Danjumahs stand to lose a lot when Biafra is birthed, but should your relative and selfish interest override ours? Your selfishness lacks the needed force to obviate and terminate our vivacious collective will. And just in case our politically emasculated Baba has conceived the ominous intent to harm our godly Nnamdi Kanu, he should watch his back, because he God has chosen for the salvation of His people He fortifies. Any attempt to harm our collective hero, Prince Nnamdi Kanu, will consume the evil one. Dear corrupt and heinous Baba, bring it on! It is time to tell this misanthrope that he is a persona non grata. The blood of Chief Bola Ige, the assassinated Minister of Justice and Attorney-General still cries for justice. We are not oblivious of the fact that he was butchered. Our Baba knows much more than we do about that matter.
All hail Biafra.
Nigeria, we reject thee.
Biafra, we long to sleep in Nigeria and wake up in thee.
Russell Idatoru Bluejack is a thinker, revolutionary writer, university tutor, and socio-economic and political analyst that writes from Port Harcourt
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