 |
|
||
|
|
|||
Wasting of Abiola: We are the ultimate losers
It is 14 years since we lost the great opportunity provided by the June 12 elections to weld Nigeria together for good. Candidate Moshood Kasimawo Olawale Abiola was keeping his date with destiny. A Yoruba Muslim, he had done the unthinkable by picking Ambassador Babagana Kingibe, a Kanuri Muslim, as running mate. Abiola was a chartered accountant. Kingibe was a diplomat. Both had seen the four walls of a university and risen to the top of their careers in the private and public sectors respectively. The nation was not bothered that both men faced the same direction when praying. For once, Nigerians felt that competence and ability to deliver on promise were more important than the colour of the candidates’ religion.
Abiola won the election massively. He worsted Othman Bashir Tofa of the Nigerian Republican Convention (NRC) so badly that many analysts gave a ‘no-contest’ verdict; it was as if an intrepid middleweight boxer had ventured into the ring with a heavyweight.
It was easy to see that Abiola would win. He was coming from ‘somewhere’. Most Nigerians could identify with his grass-to-grace story. In spite of his famed wealth and international connections, he had not lost touch with the common folk and their deprivations. He encapsulated his manifesto in one ringing sentence, the likes of which we have never seen coined since then – FAREWELL TO POVERTY.
Nigerians responded positively to Abiola because he touched something deep inside their spirit.
Since that time, Nigerians have been looking for a politician who would give them hope by his commitment to chasing poverty out of town, but so far they have waited in vain. Those who were envious of Abiola and who told us after the annulment that Abiola was not the messiah we were waiting for have been allowed by Providence to mount the saddle and prove that they could be better than Abiola. Alas, to the last man, they have proved that they were unworthy to untie the straps of Abiola’s political sandals.
When Abiola died (or was killed), the hopes of many of his countrymen for a better tomorrow died with him. For once, we saw a man who reduced the entire grammar of presidential campaign to one tangible idea which could make meaning to the people. For once we knew what we were voting for; not just who but also what. But those who have always operated like a mafia to determine the nation’s destiny said an emphatic No – and they scuttled the election.
Now we are worse off than we were in 1993. Nigeria is almost as divided as it was in 1966 – except that we are now broken into many more factions, groups and sub-groups. The man who the mafia brought out to replace Abiola and pacify the Yoruba (with the hope that they could easily control the proxy as they had done between 1976 and 1979 when he was military head of state) turned out to be an unmitigated disaster because, contrary to all calculations, he opted to prosecute his own agenda for a change. Not only was he insensitive to the yearnings of the poor, he also treated his well-to-do benefactors with the kind of disdain that Abiola would never have reserved for his dogs.
The June 12 elections gave us a great opportunity to put two university graduates in the presidency. We lost the chance. Since then, we have had intellectual impostors posing as professors of every subject under the sun. There is so much palpable vacuity in the cerebral profile of our successive tenants of power that we cannot but rue the chance we lost in 1993.
In place of Abiola’s intelligence, we have had brute force; in place of his charisma and pan-Nigerian disposition, we have a secret cult of conspirators; in place of pro-people programmes we have had agendas designed, processed and finished by foreigners in the service of their own schemes for the subjugation and further impoverishment of our people. Nigeria will continue suffering for the way it treated Abiola and his historic victory. And this is not about looking up to the heavens for some transcendental intervention. God gave you a people-friendly president and an urbane vice president but (through actions and inactions) you rejected them.
Now you have ‘messiahs’ who give you scorpions when you ask for fish. Good for you! Now you have the same people who conspired to annul that election re-enacting the same game in the recently defeated third term agenda (bravo Nzeribe!). Now the Babangida who was used to annul the election and the Obasanjo who is the eventual principal beneficiary of that annulment are at loggerheads. Obasanjo and his acolytes are busy urinating into the political wells of the Babangidas of this world. Good for them!
Those who thought they were undoing Abiola have paradoxically undone themselves. Take another look at all those involved in the conspiracy of the annulment and the eventual beneficiaries and you will find that God allowed them to be raised up so that their fall could be more resounding. One thing Abiola had which they will never have was fellow-feeling. That was why those who loved Abiola did so genuinely, not because he had allocated oil blocks to them; not because he has unleashed EFCC to pursue their rivals.
Abiola was loved and will always be loved. The story of June 12 will be told from generation to generation. Even with the efforts of hagiographers and revisionists, the truth will endure. Abiola will continue to be seen as a hero no matter the language in which the story is being told. That is more than could ever happen to the coupists of 1993 and all those who have fraudulently tried to benefit from Abiola’s titanic struggle.
Abiola’s goodness is etched in the enduring library of the peoples’ minds. That is a far more lasting legacy than a presidential library funded by contractors of an incumbent government to immortalise unborn achievements and celebrate ‘dividends of democracy’ which are visible only to the hallucinating eyes of megalomaniacs in the corridors of power.
Post Script
Recent Commentary Popular Articles
Pekulia Meesi contributes articles to NigerianMuse. To view more of Pekulia's articles, please go here If you've enjoyed this here on NigerianMuse, you are welcome to join our community. Stay Tuned via RSS ...
Bookmark this Page ...
 Pre-Register for Live! by Nigerian Muse Add Your Comments ...
|
Save This Article
| |||||