Loud Whispers with Joseph Edgar

The Need for True Peace
Please, I am address this to the Big 5 – Bola Tinubu, Atiku Abubakar, Peter Obi, Kwankwaso and Kola Abiola – on the matter of peace. Look guys, we don tire. The stress of this electioneering period all because of una ‘lifelong ambitions’ have really taken a toll on the whole nation.
Truth is that there is nothing different any of you guys will come and do. You are all five fingers of a leprous hand so make we hear word abeg. Once the results are announced, please spare us all that ‘I no go gree’ things that will extend our misery. Shebi you all have signed a peace accord and all that, let peace reign. Do not drag any matter, leave the courts and for once, just acquiesce so we can rest.

These campaigns have really drained Nigerians. It has pushed us to the limit. The antics and tactics you guys have thrown into the basket have almost driven us crazy. When one is ‘bula balluing’ all over the place, the other cannot rein in the jesters around him with Dino falling all over the place in fake mockery of BAT, while Keyamo and the rest keep upping the ante with positions that begin to make people wonder if it was not even better that one did not go to school like his principal than going to school and spewing the kinds of things that we have heard him say: “great men don’t used to go to school.” What crap?
We as Nigerians are now immune to bad government. We have decided to behave like passengers’ in a plane going through turbulence – honker down and hope for the best. That is why no matter who wins, we really do not care.
My plea is for you guys to be bold enough to accept the result once and for all and spare us all that long drawn stress a battle in the courts or streets will cause us. We are tired.
May the better man win. Thank you.

Awo, MKO, Tinubu: 30 Years a Slave
Please o, before you people will say that I am calling Yoruba people slaves, the title is borrowed from a very powerful Hollywood Movie titled ‘12 years a Slave.’ Now the link between these two stories is what I don’t know, but at times it is usually good to be dramatic in titling so that it will catch your attention.
Ok, now the story is that there is a 30-year gap between each of these Yoruba ambitions for the Presidency. A lot of people have spoken about the 30-year gap between these three great Yoruba icons. So, it took MKO exactly 30 years to come out and another 30 years we now have ‘Emilokan’.
You know some tendencies have said that OBJ is from Onitsha so they are not counting him. Kai! Well anyways, they are praying that the jinx be broken this time. Remember the narrative is that these illustrious Yoruba sons always do so well at the elections but are usually denied. Awo was the best President Nigeria never had, MKO’s story is very obvious- he won the elections but was denied by a cabal led by his best friend and since then Nigeria has known no peace.
So now the Yorubas are hoping that BAT will break the jinx and emerge as the bona fide President of our country. Well, I really do wish them luck and would have stood by them if they had thrown in some selfless evaluation and holistic national concern in throwing up a candidate. Well, you cannot really choose for a people who their bridegroom would be, all you can say is to wish them well.
I really pray and hope for their own sake that they would break the 30-year jinx, less OBJ’s tenure this time so we can finally hear word. Chai!

Peter Obi is the Real Meaning of Success
I do not think Mr. Obi will win this election. There I have said it and will continue to stand by it but what he would have won would be something much more ephemeral and long standing than just winning this election.
His candidacy has for the very first time thrown up a third leg as a meaningful and respected push at mainstream power. His candidacy has thrown up the very real fact that Nigerians can run simply by conviction. It has also further entrenched the power of youth. Moving its voice from mere slogans to real power that if not engaged could be the Achilles’ heel of mainstream power.

Obi by this wonderful run would have succeeded beyond his own wildest imagination to enthrone and lay a very solid foundation to a very different kind of politics in our polity. The conviction that issues, facts and logic could be the main vehicles for a push at political power. He had forced conversations along these lines, numbing the traditional evils that is tribalism and religion into the background of his campaigns. His push has put real teeth into the fight against corruption unlike that of Buhari’s pale engagement which saw corruption maul his administration beyond recognition.
I used to wonder what was going through Buhari’s mind as he sat on the podium during the APC presidential primaries and watched corruption dance all sorts of reggae around him. Na wa.
So, for Obi, his victory is sublime, it is heroic and cannot be measured in the way he or his many followers would want it to be.
He remains a hero and would be surely rewarded when the fruits of his huge labour begin to come forth. For now, let him just go home and rest. He has fought a good fight.

For Yemi Osinbajo, It’s Silence of a Lamb
The jury is out on this. Apparently, the good Prof has not shown any keen interest in his principals’ campaign. Preferring to sit at home to watch wrestling or play scrabble with his staff, he has totally gone silent on the ‘emilokan’ mandate.
Now there are varying schools of thought on this. Some people like my retired general classmate believe that he is utterly ungrateful. After all, ‘Asiwaju made him’. Others say that he remains perfectly right to stay clear if his principles do not agree with the mantra of the campaign, no matter who is leading it.
Well, at this point, the foundation of this argument either way is – who made Prof Osinbajo?. It is on this structure that either position sits on.
So who made Osinbajo? If you believe that Tinubu made Osinbajo, then you can be right to think that his present posturing is deeply unappreciative. They will count others like him that were manufactured and made who are still paying political dividends. They will cite Fashola, Gbaja and the rest.
Now if you say Osinbajo was not made by the Asiwaju because he was already a Professor of Law long before Asiwaju even saw the gates of Chicago State University, then you will begin to understand why the Prof would be ambivalent towards his ambition especially with the way he was treated and derided during the primaries.

So where do I stand? Una know say me I no dey fear. I stand with those who say Osinbajo owes Asiwaju nothing and I will give an example. So I cannot act or direct a play to save my life. Then I get a director and fund him to do his work. He throws in his massive talent and delivers a stupendous production which after it all, I am called on stage to collect the accolade, does that mean I made him?
See, the fact that Asiwaju has shown a huge ability in identifying talent and giving them the space to perform excellently does not mean that he made them? In fact, they made him, because all the so-called accomplishments he is bandying about could not have been made possible if they didn’t perform.
So yes, he gave them the opportunities to shine and a platform to excel, they could have gone on there to turn to ‘mumu’ like some people we know but they went on to excel using their already inbred talent.
So, my people, if like Gbaja or Tunji Bello you decide to submit to eternal servitude because you were picked to serve, then it is your own decision and it’s ok but when the other guy now decides to wake up and says, “look can I be my own man?” He should not then be vilified.
In conclusion, Prof Osinbajo’s silence remains golden. Mbok, wey all the people I have made ooo.

Lateef Kayode Jakande Is the Father of Modern Day Lagos
You see this campaign has thrown up so many issues. In fact it is billed in some quarters as the most colourful campaign since Awo went to the North in a helicopter. Things have been said and done that history has been re-written and where it cannot be re-written, it has been torn into shreds.
Today, the work of LKJ has been totally obliterated. Someone else is now the father of modern day Lagos simply because he moved IGR from N600million to N6billion or whatever figure they are bandying. And even benefited from it hugely.

The legacy of LKJ is being wiped clean. History is being retold, white-washed and repainted just so that one individual can fulfill a personal life-long ambition. This is sad, I am sad, I am not happy. This has to be redressed very quickly.
As the Executive Producer of ‘Baba Kekere’, the play I produced on LKJ, I know for a fact that as the very first civilian Governor of Lagos State, he laid a very solid foundation with which these people have attempted to build on. From education, to health, to infrastructure and all, LKJ built Lagos and positioned it for what it is today.

In fact, his inaugural address on the occasion of his second term is the real master plan that we have been hearing o. Everything is there. I mean everything. Oh my God. What is happening?
To now shift the ‘modernity’ of Lagos from 1979 when its first ever civilian governor was elected and now say modern Lagos started from when we came back from Chicago is a definite slap on history.
The Jakande family are a humble lot like their father was. I have met all of them from Mummy to Seyi to Deji and they are a wonderful crew and will not have the energy or capacity to right this wrong but then again they don’t need to lift a finger because truth always emerges no matter how long.
Jakande and not Tinubu is the father of modern day Lagos. Take it or leave it. I don go chop, no vex.

Nyesom Wike as Idi Amin of Obio Akpor
I just read a news report saying that Peter Obi of the Labour Party was denied security clearance to land in Port Harcourt. Don’t know if it is true sha. But it fits into the narrative that Mr. Wike has been throwing up since he lost the PDP presidential primaries.
Since that epoch, Nigeria has had no rest. We have all been commandeered to cry with him and go on hunger strike. He formed the G5 and they went about like semi-retired Mudi models in uniform outfits, causing trouble all over the place. Today, they have gone their separate ways choosing different candidates to back, not minding that they were weakening the structures that the party stands on.
All sorts of proclamations ascribed to him coming out comedic and dictatorial. I really do like him and really see him as one of the most outstanding leaders in modern day Nigeria, particularly these days that people are calling themselves father of modern day something, I think Wike can also be called father of something, whatever it is. He deserves it.

He should however calm down. This work no be your papa own. The tenor is almost over. By this time, you should be a little bit more conciliatory and not go about commanding a whole state on who to vote for or not. Instructing planes not to land, refusing state-owned facilities to be used by opposition, deriding traditional rulers and insulting their gods, na to flog a sitting senator wey insist on PDP for Port Harcourt remain o.
My brother, let’s calm down abeg, he no hard like that. Thank you.
Post script – there is one reader that used to send me text to be threatening me anytime I yab Wike. As I don yab this one now, I am sure he will write. Please, my brother, leave text, come meet me for Shomolu inside UNA primary school and let’s fight. Simple. Come Sunday, February 26, at 4pm and let’s take it as men. I don tire, every time once I mention Wike you will attack. Come and beat me if you can, msheew.
If you beat me, I will give you Afang and Fufu for one week, but if I beat you, you will give me a new wife from Obio Akpor. Deal?

Dapo Abiodun Begging on the Streets
He cut a very pitiable sight as he stood on top of his bus placating and begging angry people of his state. “Emiko,” he was saying in Yoruba. “Ejo ma bi nu, emi ko, CBN lo se.”
As he was talking the people were abusing him and shouting at him and he kept begging.
How do you explain to people that you have impoverished and kept near illiterate that the CBN policy was what was keeping them from drinking ogi in the morning? Mbok, the explanation is far above their pay grade. So, the only other option is to spread cash, which now backfired because the banks refused to collect so they went into a burning and looting spree.
If Abiodun is not careful, this may affect his reelection bid as he remains the face of this untold hardship to Ogun People. I pity him. I really do.

Magodo Residents Association – Funny Little Politics
Magodo is an upscale residential estate in Lagos. Located on the left-hand side of the seat of the Lagos State Government, it prides itself as a super upper-class enclave where very important people live. Not everybody there is important there sha but once you can live there either as a tenant or landlord you deem yourself as important. Abi how do you explain the one where if you talk small for WhatsApp group, they will suspend you for months.
Anyways, election is coming up and election in MRA is usually a big thing o. Almost like national politics, posters, campaign office, concerts, endorsements and all the works. People will be going door to door and then on the day of elections, they will close the gates and the multitude will come out to vote for their candidates.
You will see caps, t-shirts, everything o, even in some cases you will see our own MC Oluomo, our own FFK and our own Keyamo. We even have our own ‘emilokan’ and our own Peter Obi. Me, I like the very beautiful women who are contesting. Very refreshing.
But this time around, I noticed something. I noticed what I want to term as ‘agbaya’ politicians. Politicians who from their profiles should be contesting national elections and aiming at providing Nigerians with credible leadership but instead limit themselves to communal politics with budgets much bigger than Sowore’s budget. Sad.

If you see their profiles, you will think you are reading Awo’s profile. The huge achievements and the noble positioning and instead of going into the Senate or giving Sanwo-Olu a run for his money, they are coming into MRA to be ‘chancing’ us inside the estate.
I saw one poster; the man was coming out as Chairman of MRA and from the size of the head, you could see that the man can come out for the Presidency. The poster was beside Tinubu and Sanwo-Olu own, trying to leverage on those ones influence – you know that na those two control C of O for estate so they are mini-gods. So, Baba big head put poster beside them to show that if he lose, some people go be homeless quick.
Anyways, my advice to MRA and all these estates, is that we should allow millennials to run these estates as a first training on governance and public service. Estates and communities should be the first testing grounds and not a place for retired people who can only win these elections to stand at estate gates asking for estate dues and disturbing people’s wives.
Kai, this time not only suspension from WhatsApp group, na to tell my landlord to give me quit notice. Landlord, please don’t mind them o. Chai.

Johnnie Walker, Keep Walking Away
Please, what exactly is this brand doing under the Maryland bridge? To say it mildly, that thing is horrible. Total crap if you ask me. One was excited when that tunnel was named independence tunnel and they went ahead to put the pictures of our founding fathers and some very strong quotes exhorting Nigeria.
Now this alcoholic brand has gone to take the tunnel and in a drunken haze scatter the whole thing. I don’t even understand what they are trying to do there. First, that their Lord Lugard that is walking away should better be walking away o. No correlation with Awolowo who is beside him. The colouring has no coloration with our national colors and the graffiti is utterly meaningless.

Dem for kuku wipe out them Awo and Sardauna and Azikiwe, let’s kuku know that they have colonised the bridge but desecrating the image of our founding fathers in a drunken haze of amateurish artistic endeavour is to say the least terrible.
You know you are an alcoholic brand and as such must be very careful in your depictions, lest we start thinking that someone in your head office was drunk when approving this thing.
Please remove that crap and redesign something that celebrates our heritage and founding fathers in a more befitting way, otherwise, take a walk.