Loud Whispers with JOSEPH EDGAR

Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede: Like a Prayer

The write up was innocuous. It seeped into public consciousness like a thief in the night but slowly and very gradually gained its attention. The write up threw up the candidacy of my brother Aigboje and before you knew it, corporate Nigeria had gone gaga. I started receiving calls and text messages from all and sundry seeking clarification and confirmation.

Aigboje, if you ever go into politics kindly consider me as a media aide. My own is not that type of them Lai Mohammed or this tall Ajuri who was leading our President in Dubai, my own na confirm professionalism. “Wait, I have not heard or received any such news, let me circle back.” This was my refrain to the many people who were asking.

The reason behind their curiosity was because of my public support for our brother Asue Ighodalo and the fact that with the same background, your candidacy would do our candidacy one kind o.

So, my people, I reached out to the man. You know I am pursuing him for support for my new play, so he no dey read my chats quickly, while he dey consider how much he will give me. I asked him pointedly, “Mr. Aigboje this thing I am hearing, is it true?” Answer no come for hours and I went about my business and then he replied. He sends me a picture of a goat with the caption – Christmas goat for sale for N5,000 with small spiritual problem…

Now, I don’t know how to interpret that one now; you know these my ogas used to have big sense. That was how when I first asked Asue he said, “Edgar, I am over 60, I no fit start that kind life now.” The rest as they say na history. So, this Aigboje goat picture now, na something I really cannot decipher.

But all I would say is that this situation is confusing to me and a lot of observers. The cry for very serious people with vision, passion and integrity is beginning to be heard and this is why people like Asue, Olu, the beautiful Lorreta are jumping into the race. But this has now thrown up the issue of choice because they all come with the same virtues, pedigree, outlook and drive which makes choice very difficult for the voters.

Well, what we can all do at this point, is to welcome the development, at least if for nothing else, it would strengthen the political process, strengthen the institutions and most likely begin to push us towards credible elections. Abi is it Asue that will pay thug? Or na Aigboje that will go and do juju or na Olu Akpata will snatch the ballot box? Na wa. 

Adams Oshiomhole is Finally Becoming a Statesman

I think finally, this baba has begun to respect himself. I have seen two clips of him in the Senate taking officials of our executive arm to the cleaners. The prison people who are feeding dogs better than the Nigerians in their custody and the madam who wanted to spend N1 billion on a trip to Geneva. Yes, this is how a statesman should behave rather than all those things we have been seeing in the last few years.

We have seen Oshiomhole use his own hands to rubbish whatever legacy he had built for himself as a labour activist. He had with his foray into politics and the dogmatic approach to it, rubbed off himself of the immortality them Pa Imoudu and Frank Kokori won for themselves. He carried a paint of tar and poured it on himself, making him look like a caricature of himself and a strong candidate for a depressing graffiti on the walls of our national disgrace.

But fate seems to be smiling down at him with this his turn at the Senate. He seems to be back into his natural terrain, which is in opposition and fighting the ills of the system. His questions are pointed, well researched and his boldness coming from years of fighting the system puts him in a position where he can ask just any question.

My big daddy, I sincerely hope that this time around, you will come to the realisation that your true constituency are the downtrodden people of Nigeria and not those your friends that you have been wining and dining with and who have caused you so much reputational damage. Legacy and history should be your watchword. God has given you a final chance in this life, come back to the people my big brother. Thanks.

Godswill Akpabio: Emperor Nero of Ikot Ekpene

Not too sure if he is exactly from that village but I know that he is from the famous Anang tribe of Akwa Ibom State and Ikot Ekpene is their main area of domicile.

Over the last weekend, Akwa Ibomites and indeed Nigerians were regaled with the insensitivity of a 61-year birthday celebration which celebrated nothing really. A 61st birthday party that threw up very clearly the lack of tact of this particular leader especially in the face of the people’s grim economic prospects. The amount of cash reportedly raised and spent was adulterous. As the stadium filled with a rented crowd, he roared in after alighting from a taxpayers funded private jet and drove in a taxpayers funded motorcade into a taxpayer’s built stadium to disrespect us and make mockery of our nationhood.

Emperor Nero was famous for partying when Rome was on fire. The unseriousness with which “obong awo” has brought to the Senate presidency is unprecedented, I swear. I have looked back at all of his predecessors from Joe Wayas, through Okadigbo down to Saraki, we have not been regaled with such gimmickry and vacuous outlook.

I personally cannot even wait for it to be over so that the Senate can begin to function as a true arm of government. What we are seeing here is just something else, like a badly produced Nollywood TV series. It just drags. May God help us.

Sim Fubara: On Your Mandate We Shall Stand

Did you guys see the very convenient demolition of the Rivers State House of Assembly complex, the decamping of 25 Assembly people from PDP to APC, the ongoing shenanigans between Mr. Wike and his former protégé the sitting Governor? Are you guys watching? The imbecility of it all? The arrogance of a man who really has nothing to show but a parasitic leech on the government purse which now enables him to prance about like King Nebuchadnezzar.

I stood with Tonye Cole, the calm oil industry executive. We all saw the stuff the elections were made of and we all saw the beneficiary of that thing. Today, that beneficiary is under fire from the forces that helped him, all because access to public resources is beginning to look restricted.

Today, let me state very clearly that I stand with Mr. Sim Fubara and my reason is very simple. No matter how he came about the position, no matter the fact that he is a protégé of this Manchurian emperor, we cannot erase the fact that as at today o, he is the sitting governor with strong constitutional backing and as such one man cannot on his own now decide to shake him or attempt to unseat him just because he can?

All Rivers people should forget their differences and stand very firmly behind their Governor, Mr. Sim Fubara because this is not his fight. This is an ongoing attack on your essence, an attack on your institutions and a daring attempt to continue to enslave you and make you all eunuchs who will now be trampled by a Putin wannabe with terrible dance steps.

Nyesom Wike: A Kind Word of Advice

Mr. Wike, let me talk to you directly this morning. As I watched you attempt a Michael Jackson turn with the croaky voice and unsure footsteps, I began to wonder why you left your highlife band in Port Harcourt. You should have brought them with you so that as you continue with your hurricane, they will keep singing that your favourite tune, pepper dem.

Mr. Wike, Nigeria cannot bend for you. We are 200 million people and we cannot bend for you. Let me even tell you, we cannot bend for a military dictator, talk less of you, a civilian politician who fights with mouth and the rest.

Nigeria has known no peace since Atiku made the fatal mistake of bypassing you and going for the quiet gentleman as his running mate. In pained retaliation, you went for your party’s jugular. You tore into the party like a jealous lover who just walked in on his wife under his gateman. You formed the G-5 or whatever you called it and hiding under some nationalistic tendency threw the party under the bus. In reward, you were given your present position of which you have been going at it with the steam of an Idi Amin rather than that of an appointee minister.

See my brother, if anybody is afraid of you, me the Duke of Shomolu cannot be afraid of you, after all I fine pass you, and as such must tell you the honest to God truth. You are a problem in this country today. You are a problem to your government, a problem to Rivers State and a problem to Nigerians.

You need to calm down, you need to reorientate yourself and begin to work within the tenets of democracy. You must understand that consensus building and negotiations for the greater good of the people are the firm bedrock with which we will achieve stability and national cohesion.

Can you kindly back out? Can you kindly just let Sim be? Let him even attempt to rule after all, we all didn’t even know who he was until you brought him and forced everybody to accept him. He has not even taken his bath yet, not even understood the rudiments of governance, talk less of settling down and see what is happening now. At this rate, even if you put your steward as Governor this is how we will still end up.

My brother minister, I really beg you to calm down. This is not how true statesmanship is built. Please go and read the works of Chief Awolowo and even if Awo is far from you, go study your President Tinubu, whose ability to build consensus is legendary. There is a method to this thing and not all this “gra gra” that we are seeing everywhere. Thank you, my brother, please let’s grow this country, leave Sim alone.

Rotimi Akeredolu: Your Health Matters

Finally, His Excellency has been reported to have handed over power and has travelled to concentrate on his health. The irony of this sad episode is that he was in the forefront of the fight against Musa Yar’Adua when that one too was ruling from his hospital bed. Today, the governor, struck with what has been reported to be leukaemia, was also ruling by proxy against all common sense.

As usual, Nigerians broke into two. Those in support and those against. A lot of wahala ensued. What with court cases, President Tinubu’s intervention and media war, including accusations of forgery, it finally seems that common sense has come home to roost and the deputy governor who survived an impeachment attempt has rightly taken over power.

My prayer is a safe return of Mr. Governor as he struggles for his life even as I hope that the very insipid struggle to hold on to power would not have damaged his health beyond repair. Lessons, my people, lessons in all of this. Kai.

The Highly Revered Obong of Calabar Stool

Last week, I wrote on the traditional stool in the ancient Calabar town. I also came down very heavily on the Cross River State Government, accusing them of bias and in the process had used very irresponsible words. Words like weakling and usurper were used very freely in the article and this as expected didn’t sit well with some authorities.

They made known their displeasure in some very strong terms and I in turn felt that I should make some clarifications. Let me apologise very profusely for the wrong choice of words even as I state very categorically that they were not meant to disparage or insult anybody, talk less of the current occupant of the exalted position of the Obong of Calabar.

But that said, let me say something. Upon the receipt of the complaint, I dug further and came up with two sides. One side said that the Supreme Court judgment on the tussle for the stool was in their favour and as such they legitimately sit on the throne. The other side said no, that the Supreme Court judgment kicked them out and as such, there is no legitimate occupier of the highly respected stool, hence the use of the term usurper in my first write up of which I have apologised.

Now a third position is saying that the Supreme Court judgment was vague and as such each side was claiming victory, so to ensure peace, the state government decided that status quo be maintained. This was a third way out of the imbroglio.

Na the confusion I go carry my big head enter o. Shebi I did not see easy Afang and fufu to sit in my Uyo and eat, I now carry my head to Calabar to enter trouble that no concern me. Is it not a curse that I am looking for like this?

One side is saying, Edgar must retract and very robustly because he cannot say this about the Oba of Benin or the Ooni of Ife, is it because our Obong is peace-loving – for which I thank him because me I don’t have power for stress. The other side is saying Edgar stand and fight, shebi it is court they will take you to and we will stand by you.

My brother, the last time I heard that phrase stand and fight and we go support you, na when EFCC carry me and till today the man wey say stand only send N50,000 to Duchess and promptly switched off his phone.

One interesting thing in all of this before I end my treatise is the fact that I have learnt that the Attorney General and Commissioner of the state whose main job is to interpret the judgment is the biological son of the other side who is saying- I no go gree. Interesting.

In conclusion, it is not to pour excreta on the floor and when I react you will come and threaten me with all sorts. The ancient throne of the Obong of Calabar has its set of traditions and ethos for succession that has guided it since when Mary Slessor first came to eat  in the place. If the processes are respectfully followed, we would not be having this situation. Once the right thing is done, there would be no Edgar hurling words that would lead to a need for retraction. Thank you.