New Speaker Dimeji Bankole As Bachelor November 11, 2007 | posted by Nigerian Muse (Archives)

 

INDEPENDENT

New Speaker As Bachelor
Sun, 11 Nov 2007

Have you heard the news? Nigerian girls, ladies and even married women, are on the loose! Everyone of them, I hear, wants a piece of the gap-toothed bachelor in the House of Representatives and the heat is being turned on in ways that scare the star actor so much so that mere days after newspaper headlines screamed of his bachelorhood, he started appearing publicly in the company of a particular lady ostensibly to ward off sexual harassment. Ha!

I am coming to that in a moment, but first let’s discuss bachelors. Have you ever attended real bachelors’ raves? I’m talking about those parties where intended bridegrooms revel in the presence of their friends – both married and single – and ladies of easy virtue (not necessarily call girls, though those too are usually there on hire purchase) and throw all caution to the wind in a bid to have the mother of all revelries just before getting married.

At such gigs, the number one bachelor gets just about any girl he wants. In fact, his friends ensure he does. Many a bachelor’s party has ended in sexual orgies of alarming dimensions. Friends – I mean the culprits who fund such raves – go out of their way to hire girls that will give the bachelor-of-the-moment a raunchy time.

Today, the House of Representatives has a sweet-speaking bachelor-of-the-moment as its new speaker. He is 38-year-old Dimeji Saburi Bankole. He has just replaced scandal-enmeshed Patricia Etteh. He has a good pedigree and, for the first time, Nigeria has a speaker who can truly speak.

Although he will turn 38 on Wednesday, November 14, 2007, Bankole is not likely to opt for a bachelor-birthday party in America like his much older predecessor, Etteh, did. He is a scion of Chief Alani Bankole, a former acting chairman of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP). The younger Bankole, a two-term lawmaker, is a product of the Baptist Boys High School, Abeokuta, Ogun State, where he hails from. He holds an Economics degree from the University of Reading, England. He has another degree in Military Technique from the Oxford University, UK, after which he still did another stint at Harvard University, USA.

Oh yes, Bankole is a well-read man. "But he is a bachelor and that makes him suspect. If at his age he cannot hold a woman down long enough to marry her despite his academic and political success, then there is more to him that meets the eye," opines a concerned citizen.

Like everyone else, including President Umaru Yar’Adua, I am banking on Bankole, hoping that he won’t get carried away with the raunchy mentality of the bachelor he is; that he won’t become reckless in an insatiable urge for all kinds of strange bedfellows for legislative sex – that is the kind of sex you settle for when you want to get some things done in the House at all costs. Let’s hope he does not get himself into some other scandal to get out of which he would desperately need some strange bedfellows.

Bachelors turn their last hurrahs into elaborate getaways with the guys; a big celebration, regardless of prying eyes. There was a time when bachelor parties lasted a mere eight hours. These parties would commence in the early evening, around 7 p.m., then casually slink into the wee hours of the next morning, with only a few of the hardiest men still standing at 3 a.m. or 4 a.m. Most slept off their hangovers in their own beds or in the bosom of some easy lady.

Thankfully, the down-and-dirty days of grass, punch, orgies and easy ladies are disappearing fast. Well-travelled bridegrooms have upped the ante beyond their immediate environment, planning longer, pricier getaways that resemble honeymoon trips more than bachelor parties. Even at that, it isn’t something Bankole should indulge in as Mr. Speaker.

Such getaways are really not the exclusive preserve of bachelors, I have since discovered from ‘legislative runs’ that take place in the House of Reps. For instance, Etteh’s N628 million gaffe broke about the time she was celebrating her birthday in America.

I have got some fears for this ‘Banky’ that we now must bank on. The cost and time involved in legislative experiments – like bachelor getaways – can weigh too much on the nation. It is generally believed that a man cannot truly exhibit the deep values of leadership when he hasn’t already started living them out both as a husband and a father. As a bachelor, you are naturally distanced from the pain or hurt of divorce, separation, spousal infidelity and plain old marital insecurity. Unless you have been married before, your knowledge of such sentiments or emotions is simply perfunctory and reduced to theoretical analyses.

Bankole is a bachelor, for crying out loud! One can only hope he realises the enormity of the challenges in front of him versus his downside as a man without a wife; a helper fit for him! Even his father, the more experienced Bankole, who must have surreptitiously lobbied for his son to be made speaker, had to say things to journalists that would shore up public confidence in his son.

The older Bankole cried: "My son won’t disappoint Nigerians. The fact that the House voted overwhelmingly for him (304 votes to his opponent’s 20) shows that his colleagues repose much confidence in him. I have no doubt in my mind that he will live up to the expectation of Nigerians and perform creditably." Not once did Dimeji’s father, Alani, hit on the fact that he didn’t succeed in making his son take a wife on time.

I have asked around the House and, believe me, the consensus is that the new speaker ought to take a wife, ASAP (As Soon As Possible). Interestingly, Bankole used to be a director on the board of a company called ASAP. Some calculate that he would get married before or around the turn of the year. Others argue that the longer it takes him to do that now that he is the speaker, "the more unnecessary pressure he would have to face from ladies who would now desire a romp in his bed, if nothing else or a more permanent contract like marriage. So let him just do it," they say.

I say no! Bankole should not just fulfil righteousness by rushing a wedding band onto some girl’s finger, although one young and pretty damsel, Olaitan, seems to be the favoured bride-to-be. Olaitan was the one Bankole purposely took with him when he paid a courtesy visit to his home governor, Otunba Gbenga Daniel (OGD), last Monday. It was deliberate. Bankole knew that such a visit would attract the prying cameras of photojournalists. But if he must marry Olaitan, he’d better make a success and respectable show of it.

At OGD’s, he knew that at some point, some zealous reporter would ask for the correct name and description of the lady in the picture. He was ready for that. What isn’t clear is who gave Olaitan’s name as ‘Olaitan Bankole’ -– she or Bankole?

Although she looks confident enough to call her own shots – bespectacled and looking an inch or two taller than Bankole – I suspect that Olaitan would have cleared with her ‘boyfriend’ if she has his permission to act as his missus as well as introduce herself as such.

Again, looking at the way Olaitan bared her left shoulder in a picture published on page five of the National Mirror, Tuesday, November 6, 2007, I think she is not just self-assured but also diffident enough to announce to the press that she is ‘Mrs. Speaker Bankole’ even when she knows that is yet to happen, formally.

That photo-caption gaffe is only one in a series of little mistakes that a bachelor makes. It is not a costly mistake, but more serious ones may soon come if Bankole isn’t careful. Being a young man – the parlance is ‘young, free and single’ -– also means that he must lead the House like a wizened old man and not with the exuberance of a bachelor that is ‘young, free and single’.

Etteh messed up a unique opportunity to celebrate the dignity of womanhood and disciplined passion of motherhood while she was the speaker. Instead, she simply disgraced those who got her into the top seat. Her proponents had thought that since she had gotten a basic Law diploma from the University of Abuja, she would talk, behave and lead like a ‘learned colleague’ and not just like the hairdresser they all know her to be. They were dead wrong; Etteh simply tried to turn the House into her salon.

Now that 304 legislators have chosen a bachelor to be the nation’s number four most important citizen, Bankole can choose to be recklessly stupid (and claim, God forbid, ‘after all, they all knew I am only 37 and a bachelor without domestic responsibilities before they picked me’) or he could choose to be wise by consulting widely before he slams down the hammer on crucial legislative decisions.

"To help himself, the new speaker should just go ahead and marry the woman he has in hand rather than hope that he has a better chance now to start experimenting afresh as an exalted speaker. Believe me, his legislative responsibilities would choke him out of private life the longer it takes him to get married," a female lawmaker told Man-U-Script a few days ago.

Now don’t get me wrong and I wouldn’t like to have other elderly bachelors asking for my head. Marriage is definitely not a prerequisite to holding a political office, but you will agree with me that the word ‘responsible’ makes more sense to a married man than it ever does to a bachelor. You need to be in it to feel it.

Bachelors are carefree, but Nigeria does not need a carefree speaker. So Bankole’s top legislative action must be to legislate himself into marriage. Believe me, all of Nigeria would applaud him for that. Though he is a Muslim, I would like Bankole to quickly survey this Christian scripture of Paul to Timothy, a young man who was entrusted with the responsibilities of the elderly in leading a church.

"Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example (for everyone) in speech, in life (and in the House)" (1 Timothy 4:12). The verse is quite apt for Dimeji Saburi Bankole. He must realise that 304 lawmakers like him have simply voted in an all important paradigm shift that challenges the status quo. Bankole must, therefore, jettison all tendencies of youthful exuberance and, like a Solomon, must demonstrate that wisdom is not a Methuselah function.

All Nigerian youths now have an ambassador in Bankole; if he fails, it may become thrice as difficult for any Nigerian youth to be taken serious in politics until another bright light shines through from the dungeon of geriatric neglect. I can almost hear the Nigerian youth sending Bankole a phone text to say: "Yo Banky. Enof respect. Listen to ur popsie and don’t fail us. We’re banking on you. Remember Etteh. Let the boys win this time, OK? Grace."

PROFILE

Oladimeji Saburi Bankole born November 14, 1969 was a businessman before being elected to the House. A Muslim Egba, Bankole was born in Abeokuta to Alani Bankole, a businessman, former National Vice Chairman of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), Seriki Jagunmolu of Egbaland and Oluwo Iporo Ake; and his wife, Atinuke Bankole, Ekerin Iyalode of Egbaland.

He attended Baptist Boys High School, Abeokuta from 1979, Albany College, London, England from 1985, University of Reading, Reading, England from 1989, the University of Oxford’s Officer Training College, Oxford, England in 1991, and Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S. in 2005.

Bankole is a polo player, and is a member of the Lagos Polo Club, where his position is defence. He also enjoys football. He was the Director of Freight Agencies Nigeria Limited from 1995 until 1998, Executive Director of Operations of West African Aluminum Products Limited from 1998 until 2003, and Director of ASAP Limited from 2000 until 2003. He is an economist. He established a charity, the Emma Skipper Foundation. Among the tasks the organisation has undertaken are giving micro-credit loans and awarding scholarships.

In 2003, Bankole was elected to the House of Representatives on the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) ticket to represent Abeokuta South Federal Constituency of Ogun State. He was Deputy Chairman of the House Committee on Finance while Aminu Bello Masari was speaker, and was also previously Chairman of the House Committee on Land Transport. Other committees he has sat on are the panels on Defence, Internal Affairs and Banking, and Currency.

Bankole was re-elected in April 2007. He considers his legislative interests to be those related to defence and finance.

A large segment of the PDP, led by Hon. Farouk Lawan and including Bankole, called for Etteh’s resignation at the peak of her N628 million scandal. It was reported that Bankole, among multiple other contenders, hoped to succeed her as early as October 5, 2007.

After Etteh’s resignation from the post on October 30 (along with her deputy, who was also caught up in the scandal), Integrity (anti-Etteh) Group member, Terngu Tsegba, became Interim Speaker. Samson Osagie of Edo State nominated Bankole for the post of Speaker, and Lynda Ikpeazu of Anambra State seconded the proposal. On November 1, he was elected to succeed Etteh. His challenger was Osun State Representative, George Jolaoye, whom he beat by 304 votes to 20 (and four abstentions). Etteh was among those who voted against Bankole. The new deputy speaker is Bayero Usman Nafada.

On his election, Bankole said "I am taking over the mantle of leadership at a very difficult time. But these are hard times; we need to build confidence again and assure the populace that we are still their representatives. I want an independent House that Nigerians will be proud of, this is my first task."

NM NOTE

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HOUSE OF REPS Speakers’ Roll Call:

FIRST REPUBLIC
Jaja Wachuku NCNC October 1960 - January 1966 (?)

SECOND REPUBLIC
Edwin Ume-Ezeoke NPN October 1979 -  December 1983

THIRD REPUBLIC
Salisu Buhari PDP June - July 22, 1999
Ghali Umar Na’Abba PDP July 1999- May 2003
Aminu Bello Masari PDP June 2003 - May 29, 2007
Patricia Etteh PDP June 5 - October 30 2007
Dimeji Bankole PDP November 1, 2007 - ???

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