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Obasanjo and power to crush rebellions (3)
By Emmanuel Ogbunwezeh
Continued from Friday
So much for an analysis of these men who advise
Obasanjo. Such a collection of retired murderers, pocket crooks, certified
ignoramuses, midget tyrants and borrowed intelligences have nothing useful to
offer save speaking their perverted minds in an unintelligent way. All I want
to state is that these crooks represent a monumental mockery of democracy. This
stance was programmed to be the case, by the dictatorial propensities of
Obasanjo. He and PDP contrived a stealing of the people’s mandate in
2003. In that one fell swoop, he destroy the voice of credible opposition. He
bought over a House of Senators compromised by greed. Those whose voices they
could not buy, they blackmail and sometimes eliminated. We have not really
heard the last word on the fate that befall Okadigbo, who till date remained
the only voice of rationality, ever to rise in challenge of Obasanjo’s
unrefined festival of political puerility. What is the role of the senate and
House of Representatives, when this cabal of Obasanjo’s Yes-men would
wake up from their imbecilic slumber, and hand the incumbent imbecile, a blank
cheque of powers to deal with legitimate voices of reason dissent.
The people are the
sovereign in every democracy. In Nigeria , the patience of the sovereign has
been stretched beyond every elastic limit by waves and waves of bad government
policy and lackadaisical attitude. The senate betrayed the people the day it
converted itself into Obasanjo’s rubber stamp. They people lacking a
legislative bulwark against the rampaging advance of tyranny, rose in various
ways and manners to ask this incumbent in his majestic incompetence, to pay
heed to their distress calls and address the concerns and issues bordering on
their welfare. The ogre took offence at the people’s expression of their
pain and dissatisfaction. He, instead of addressing these gaping concerns, kept
on piling economy pressures on their already battered frames. He has increased
the price of domestic fuel, without rhyme or reason and expects Nigerians to
shut up their mouths and die in silence. To this end, he sent a bill to his
rubber stamp senate, seeking to eviscerate the Nigerian Labour Congress, which
consequent on Obasanjo’s decimation of legitimate opposition, arose to
fill the vacuum left here, in canvassing for the rights of the people. The
ethnic militias dotting the Nigerian socio-political landscape are not outlaw
groups like this present government is. They represent the legitimate
aspirations of their various peoples, whom government’s avaricious
policies are seriously frustrating.
The questions before us
boils down to: One: Who elected the members of this council of States? Whose
aspirations are they representing? What constitutional or legitimate role do
they have to ask Obasanjo to crush opposition? In a civilized society,
oppositions are not crushed; they are allowed to ventilate their disagreements.
The opponents of war in Britain have constantly peppered Tony Blair with their
disagreements and protests. The police, the SSS, or the Army, like Obasanjo
would readily do, was rolled out to deal decisively with them. George
Bush’s economic policies and isolationist foreign policy, has been the
butt of newspaper columnists from the East coast to the West. Washington Post
or New York Times have not been proscribed or its editors quizzed by the Secret
Service for criticizing Bush’s policies. But our August Emperor Obasanjo
who does not know the definition of democracy is constantly degenerating into a
mad tyrant. He has crushed the Insider Magazine with his tyrannical weight. He
has disembowelled the Nigerian Labour Congress through judicial manipulations.
He is has now been advised by a league of failed presidents and incompetent
governors to stamp his head on anyone who raises his voice against
irreconcilable stupidities of his government.
Obasanjo’s
dalliance with these retired misfits, whose executive incompetence left Nigeria
a legendary, fractured fairy tale, is simply the fastest way of digging his
political grave. He may never realise it. He is touting force as an option,
after failing woefully to learn any lessons from his misadventures in Odi and Zaki
Biam. This may be the most stupid administration we have had in Nigeria in
recent times, I think. I pray I am wrong. But lets see him roll out the tanks
to crush the protests that is sure to greet his atrociously inconsiderate
hiking of domestic fuel price, as the Council of thieves had advised. Lets
equally see him arrest Ojukwu for some flimsy igbohphobic reasons. Lets see him
send the army into Port Harcourt , instead of convoking a sovereign national
conference. History always confronts every villain with an opportunity for
greatness. It confronted Macbeth with infinite possibilities of becoming a
great host or an eternal villain. Macbeth chose the latter, murdering sleep to
that and marrying insomnia in the process. IBB was confronted with the same
historical kairos. He chose to become an accomplished villain. He scuttled an
opportunity for Nigeria ’s political renaissance. Today, Obasanjo is
presented with the greatest opportunity of inscribing his name in the sands of
time as a great leader by convoking a Sovereign Conference to address the
contemptible inflexibilities plaguing the Nigeria of today. He may spend his
time coughing his eyes out, or he may take the bull by the horns and write
himself into history. His sycophantic courtiers may keep on deceiving him with
their scripted lullabies that immunize him from the realities outside Aso rock.
But all in all, the day of reckoning is simply around the corner. All the
elements are watching.
Concluded.
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