Who will save Nigeria in post-colonial jurisdictions, crisis and confusion?

By Hon .Emma Chidi Ofoegbu

The making of the current  All Progressive Congress (APC) government-led Bola Tinubu is the architecture constructed by Mohammad Buhari, to surreptitiously complete his third-term agenda or life-term project.

Bola Tinubu was /is the leading spokesman, propagandist, and chief blackmailer of President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan in 2014 when he openly and uncontrollably constituted the most ‘TOXIC OPPOSITION’ against Jonathan.

With their headquarters in the South-West; and Lagos state as centre of the Propaganda to demonize and destroy every positive thing Goodluck Jonathan represented and did, in collaboration with other militant, anti-democratic, and toxic associations like Occupy Nigeria, led by the likes of Prof. Wole Soyinka and Tunde Bakare among other anti-Goodluck Jonathan’s groups.

They formed and sponsored to destroy Jonathan’s legacy, and attack and possibly kill anyone supporting his reelection. Igbos were singled out in 2015, southwest, the way it also happened in 2023 in the South-West, particularly Lagos State, for attacks and killing under the leadership of Mohammad Buhari, in connivance with APC Yoruba leaders including their Obas,  in the South-West, particularly, Lagos State.

The 2014 epistle against President Goodluck Jonathan according to Bola Tinubu. In 2014, Sen. Bola Tinubu in one of the anti-Jonathan rallies he organized in the South-West made the following caustic, and inciting remarks against Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, with Bisi Akande smiling and standing on his left-hand side with other APC leaders in South-West: ‘ Nigerians, the only way to have steady light and fuel is to remove Goodluck Jonathan. And I promise you in 6 months, Nigeria will be swimming in crude oil and fuel. Buhari will pay all of you N5000.00 monthly for being jobless. Our youth will be gainfully employed, with 3 million jobs a year ‘.

This was in 2014 and after the 2023 presidential election conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) under Prof. Mahmoud Yakubu. The INEC Chairman, and Supreme Court, selected, announced, and endorsed him as Nigeria’s president;  against Peter Obi the elected president who emerged on the Labour Party platform.

Today, what is the truth about Bola Tinubu’s blackmailing and propaganda against Jonathan in 2014, when what went for N200.00 during Goodluck Jonathan’s era in 2014, is now N1,500.00 in 2023, when Bola Tinubu himself is sitting as Nigeria president, selected or otherwise.

The obtuse failures in all sectors of the economy are so obvious, open, and loud, that even those in the intellectual wing of the anti-Goodluck Jonathan government movement in Nigeria, and southwest in particular like Prof Wole Soyinka, Tunde Bakare, and others from the South-West and their extension in the North, have gone into a state of hibernation.

Where do we go from this state of lack of economic and political direction, in the context of a leader, who will be humble enough to admit his inadequacies and open incapacitation to initiate a leeway that can revolutionize and retrieve the lost times and opportunities?

Borrowing a leaf from the idea of an authority. In the words of Steve Harvey,’ If you don’t separate yourself from distractions, your distractions will separate you from your goals’.

The President’s ethnic bias against the Igbos, whom Yoruba APC leaders are blaming for the APC defeat in Lagos State and other climes, is one such distraction. The ethnic appointments you have done so far to push Igbos out of state relevance are fighting back against your government, and it’s so embarrassing that there is no place to hide. So reconfiguring your bias against Igbos to be your friends, and accepting them as a resulted oriented people, who are averse to inefficiency and anti-democratic inclinations, and who don’t have time for excuses, and looking for a shoulder to cry on, will help your government to climb up from the morass ethnic politics and anti-Igbo appointments have pushed your government into.

The international economic and political order and systems were not designed by the Authors, to facilitate the development of post-colonial jurisdictions and spaces. Indigenous approaches to solving economic, political, and social problems, will be the foundations on which to develop African economies and all else that were under the tentacles of colonialism and influences, then and now.

That is a better way to start afresh and make significant progress, not through excuses and propaganda; or trying to blame or ban the opposition parties’ criticisms, or social media outlets.

Hon. Ofoegbu, Secretary, Azubuike Emmanuel Umeadi Campaign Council, Labour Party House of Representative, Alimosho Federal Constituency, Lagos State.