Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
All that any Igbo charlatan needs to hoodwink many a Nigerian leader is to claim that he has the beans to bring the Igbo people to the centre after the Biafra war.
It works like magic for the so-called patriotic leaders of Nigeria such that they embrace the hoodwinking Igbo wannabes with all kinds of favours.
In this season of the Anambra State gubernatorial elections, the antics of bringing the pre-eminent state in the Southeast to the centre is as ever enriching the dupes at the expense of the Nigerian establishment once more.
People are not campaigning to win the votes of the people but are only telling tall tales of having been endorsed by Abuja to literally be appointed the governor of the state without any say of the supposedly “independent” Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in the matter.
It’s so sad seeing out-and-out charlatans claiming that they can use all Nigerian institutions, from the Supreme Court to the Presidency, as handmaidens of perfidy.
Nothing is again sacred in the country, given the wide access to “orders from above” that the odious lot claims to have.
When a pathetic school dropout stresses out loud everywhere that he has Nigerian leaders under his thumb you cannot but feel deep shame for the country.
It did not start today and there is hardly any need to mention names because the characters belong to recent Nigerian history.
Not so long ago, one loud self-promoting Abuja-anointed godfather of Anambra politics went about telling all and sundry that the then Nigerian President had given him a list of politicians that the president did not want elected from Anambra State!
The president was confronted with what the godfather had said only for the president to ask the cocky thug in a meeting of Anambra stakeholders in Aso Villa: “Have I ever sent you to anybody?”
The reply from the bully was “No, sir!”
Incidentally, after INEC announced winners of the Senatorial and House of Reps elections in Anambra State, the INEC-declared names were changed on account of “orders from above”!
The almost three-year experience of the winning candidates in regaining their stolen mandates was only a tip of the iceberg in a large story that starred the Thursday, July 10, 2003 abduction of the State Governor by a host of federal forces led by a Police AIG.
It was only the governor’s miraculous phone call to the then Vice-President that spawned a chain reaction that restored him to power.
The treasonable act was dismissed as “a family affair” by the then president.
A Justice of the court of due process who gave the ruling that the governor actually resigned had to quit the judiciary in disgrace, even as the AIG who led the abduction team died mysteriously.
A Judge of the Enugu High Court, claiming he had powers to oust a sitting governor from another state, gave the order ousting the beleaguered Anambra Governor whereupon the Federal Government conduced to immediately withdraw the governor’s security details.
Anambra Government House was denied of official guard for months on end. People’s power kept the governor in office as thousands of Anambra men, women and children kept vigil at the Government House.
At about 4 AM on November 10, 2004 I got a call from a major Anambra stakeholder that some hoodlums brought into the state in 40-odd buses had burnt every building of government business and the broadcasting houses while the police stood idly by, obeying “orders from above”.
The mayhem lasted all of three days with the law enforcement agents of Nigeria in tacit support.
The then ruling party’s national chairman was pained enough, fearing that the regime may collapse over the Anambra matter like the NPN in the 2nd Republic, that he courageously wrote to the then Nigerian President: “I call on you to act now and bring any and all the criminals, even treasonable activity, to a halt. You and you alone have the means.”
The poor party chairman lost his job for his effrontery in the court of the emperor.
It should not be forgotten that the president wrote a public letter to press home the fact that the lawless Anambra godfather had led the embattled governor to his presidential office in Aso Villa to confess that the governor was rigged into office without knowing how it was done!
The godfather who had no immunity was not arrested!
In the 2007 gubernatorial election in Anambra, all the popular candidates were excluded from the ballot by INEC on “orders from above” so that the beloved servant of the president was declared the winner of the election with a number far greater than the list of registered voters in the state!
The number had to be changed following the embarrassment after the announcement of the phony result.
The “elected” governor was perforce thrown out of office by the Supreme Court after only serving 16 days in stolen power!
It is as though history is about to repeat itself with the return of the man with tall claims of taking Anambra State to the centre and being backed by Federal Might.
In Nigeria, things always change and remain the same, whether PDP or APC or RIP!
It is a pathetic country that the “independent” INEC announces the winner of a governorship election only for the Supreme Court to appoint as governor the man who came dead last in the election.
The romance of Nigerian leaders and Igbo dropouts knows no bounds.
There was a recent presidential visit to the eastern heartland, and there is the talk about Mr. President being misquoted as per his reservations or lack thereof on the visit, but my take on the matter is that it smacks of gutter shamelessness to fly all the way from Abuja to commission an ordinary gutter in Imo State!