The Insight by Lateef Adewole
There was this story in Yoruba folklore. It was about a very powerful warrior, whose conquests were known from far and wide in the land. His town was feared by other towns because of him. No one dared wage war against them and others dreaded the warrior’s town waged war against them too. He has supernatural powers that required that three things were sacred and must be maintained whenever he went to war. These were the secrets of his successes in the battle fields.
One day, out of so much love for his wife, he decided to reveal the secrets of his powers to her. He said that once he is in the battlefield, there were three “atupa” (palm oil powered local lamps) that must be lit and continued to burn till he returns. They must never be extinguished. Otherwise, defeat was imminent. The second was “ewon” (a sacred chain) that was hanged on the ceiling. It must never touch the ground. And the the third one… then he paused.
The wife pressed him for what that was, he then remembered the warning of his ancestor about trust. That was how he just told his wife a different (fake) thing. They continued to live their lives peacefully and happily until when the warrior married another wife. This did not go down well with the first wife but she had no choice. She accepted and they continued their lives. One year, another town decided to wage war against this powerful warrior’s town. His people were never afraid as he led them to the battlefield.
Unfortunately, his enemies found a way to get through to his first wife back home and lured her to reveal her husband secrets. Because of her anger about her husband’s marriage to another woman, she decided to exact her revenge. That was how she went to the three “atupa” and blew off their burning lights. Immediately, her husband felt a sign at the war front, quickly retreated home, only to meet his wife already removed his “ewon” from the ceiling and threatened to drop it on the ground, an abomination. Despite all his pleas, the woman dropped it on the floor. This weakened him the more.
Fortunately for him, what would have ended his life was the third secret which he did not reveal to his wife. That saved his life and he eventually overcome his enemies who had pursued him to his home to finish him off, with the confidence that all his powers were already destroyed by his traitor wife. He also killed the wife in the process.
This story demonstrates a wise admonition by the Yorubas that whenever two people are close as friends or in love as spouses, they must always give allowance for the day of quarrel. What does this mean? It means that, on no account should someone trust people they think they love so much as friend or lover with all their secrets. This is because, same friend or lover could turn around to use such secrets kept with them against the person when there is quarrel between the two friends.
I narrated this story in the light of what is going on that could be seen as a “roforofo” fight that Alhaji Atiku Abubakar is waging against President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in his desperate quest to become the president of Nigeria. The world has witnessed in the last few weeks, how the presidential candidate of the PDP in the last presidential election, Atiku, dug into Tinubu’s background, in an attempt to unearth some tsunamic revelations that could unseat Tinubu.
This followed his failure at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal (PEPT) to defeat Tinubu. The case was instituted to challenge Tinubu’s victory at the polls in February 25, 2023, where Tinubu beat him to the second position, having scored 8,794,726, as against Atiku’s 6,984,520. Another challenger is Peter Obi of Labour Party, who came a distance third with a score of 6,101,533. Both challenged Tinubu’s electoral victory and lost at the PEPT. It was after this loss that Atiku began his journey to dig out any possible dirt about Tinubu.
In actual sense, it was not really about Atiku challenging Tinubu’s victory, which is his constitutional right, that is the problem, but the manner he has been going about it. After losing at the tribunal, Atiku decided to dig into the academic records of Tinubu from his alma matter, Chicago State University (CSU), USA. He claimed that the documents, including the certificate, that Tinubu submitted to INEC are fake. He therefore took the university to court, not just to verify the authenticity of Tinubu’s certificate, but to release all (with emphasis) documents relating to Tinubu that exist in that school, even including some other peoples’ own. Really?
This shocked many watchers. This is because, that has been a subject of controversies for many years, which has been cleared one way or the other, by the school or other independent interested persons who sought clarifications. Therefore, when Atiku threw all his might into digging out every possible thing about him, to the extent of going to court in the USA, some of us became concerned. This is because, many people believed that Tinubu and Atiku are bosom friends of many decades.
Personally, I was alerted. I felt that, given such long standing relationship I believed existed between the two, there might be some “secrets” that Tinubu could have confided in Atiku, unknown to the public, which Atiku was digging for evidence, to reveal to the public, so as to nail his supposed friend, in order to remove him from office for him to replace him as the president of Nigeria. I followed the case with bated breath.
The tension became higher when Tinubu also attempted to block him by speedily appealing the Magistrate court order granted in Atiku’s favour that CSU should released all the documents he requested to him. That was when the real drama started. Even many people who were previously less or not interested became aroused. Everyone was waiting to see that “smoking gun”, as Dr. Ruben Abati referred to it, that Atiku would exhumed. He eventually won at the higher court which upheld the earlier order of the Magistrate court. The documents were released on Monday.
The deposition to the released documents was done by the Registrar of the CSU, Mr. Caleb Westberg, under oath. Despite the series of interpretations and misinterpretations (deliberate) of what all that entailed, what could be the summary of the whole thing is that, nothing new was released. Virtually all the documents concerning Tinubu, which were released to Atiku, were already submitted to INEC before, presented at the tribunal, and many of them have been on social media for years. So, what is new? This must be why the presidency called all that efforts as ‘fishing expedition’.
One thing is yet to be clear to me, what did Tinubu intend to achieve with the attempted blockage through his appeal at the court? Was it just to create sensation and drama, because, loads of that actually happened. Nigerians were on their toes, home and abroad, waiting anxiously for what becomes of their newly elected president of four months. Those who are his supporters were worried about losing the mandate they gave him because of things they knew nothing about. His traducers were excited that they have finally got him where they wanted him. They celebrated too early.
I actually warned many of my friends in the opposition not to raise their hope so high, so as not to be heartbroken all over again, for the fifth time. They hoped Tinubu wouldn’t win his party primary election and get the ticket, he did. They believed he would lose the presidential election, with all the hurdles placed on his path, he won. Many even said he won’t be sworn-in. He was sworn-in. They said he would lose at the PEPT, he defeated all his three challengers. And now this? I can only imagine the “severe pain” (as Fayose would say), they are going through now.
Surprisingly, despite the clarity in that deposition and the lack of substance in the documents released, many are still hoping for some ‘miracles’ that will happen at the Supreme Court, where the losers have taken their appeals to, using same documents. They are being led by the nose by their lawyers who continued to raise their hopes by giving (mis)interpretations to all that to suit their sentiments and emotions. Such were the responses of Barr. Kalu Kalu, to the questions asked by a reporter at the World Press Conference, hosted by Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, on Thursday. What did Kalu say?
The reporter asked what exactly are the documents they received, what are their findings and how will they be of any use to help their case at the Supreme Court? Barr. Kalu responded by regurgitating same accusations that have been serially thrashed and finally disposed off by the CSU Registrar in his depositions. He also said Supreme Court will have no choice but to admit these “new” evidences. I don’t want to go into whether he was right or not. All will be clear when the case starts and judgement is finally given.
My concern has been the seeming bitterness with which Atiku has been pursuing this case. I often wondered how their mutual friends feel about all of these. He doesn’t seem to give a hoot about that. This was exhibited in his personal response to a question thrown at him at that conference. A reporter asked him about an insinuation by some people that what he is doing amounts to betrayal of Tinubu, given the past supports he enjoyed from him, especially during his trying time when he was at war with his boss, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who hounded him. Atiku responded by dismissing such. He claimed that actually, he joined Tinubu to form Action Congress (AC), on which platform he contested for the presidency in 2007, against the anointed candidate of his boss, who was the late Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’adua.
He claimed that after he won the party primary, Tinubu sent delegation of five people to him to ask that he be picked as the vice presidential candidate, which he refused because he never believed in or wanted a muslim-muslim ticket. He emphasised that he still doesn’t want and won’t support it now, in an attempt to throw jab at the Tinubu-Shettima presidency. He premised his position on the diversity of the country based on ethnicity and religion, and need for inclusivity. He received a resounding applause for such stateman-like position. Well, Alhaji Atiku might not have said the complete truth. I don’t believe that was altruism. Why do I say this? History don’t lie.
In 1993, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar was among the three front runners for the Social Democratic Party (SDP) presidential ticket. At the primary in Jos, Plateau State, he came third with a total vote of 2,066. The second position went to Babagana Kingibe with 3,225. While the late Chief MKO Abiola led with 3,617. With the narrow margin between the first and the second, another round of voting was called for the second day. Then, negotiations and horsetrading happened. It was reported that the Shehu Musa Yar’adua’s camp, from where Atiku emerged, negotiated to have Atiku, a muslim to be the vice presidential candidate to Abiola, another muslim, to fly a muslim-muslim ticket. And Alhaji Atiku Abubakar was very fine and happy with that. So, what is he saying now, 30 years after?
Unfortunately for him, Abiola picked Kingibe, another muslim and they eventually ran a muslim-muslim ticket in the revolutionary June 12, 1993, presidential election, which they won, but was annulled by the ‘enemies’ of Nigeria. Even when he was not the eventual vice presidential candidate, he was part of that party that presented the muslim-muslim ticket. He never protested, disagreed or left the party. Where was this principle of not wanting muslim-muslim ticket because of inclusivity then?
Ironically, it was that far back that Tinubu and Atiku’s paths crossed politically. Until recently, I used to think Atiku brought Tinubu into the Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM) then, the political machinery of Shehu Musa Yar’adua, where they both belonged. Tinubu stated that he was already a member before Atiku joined. That was new to me. Both were in SDP. Tinubu was elected to the senate on that platform while Atiku wanted to be president. This was how far back their relationship has been. This is why we are amazed at how Atiku has been going about his quest to become the president, especially with his latest moves.
He seems to be ready burn all the bridges in a fight-to-finish. I used to argue some years ago, that politically, Tinubu and Atiku are like two sides of a coin. I often said that any government led by Tinubu will be as if it is being led by Atiku, and vice versa. This is because, I felt each would get anything he wants from the other in his government. May be I thought wrong. With this level of acrimony being promoted by Atiku, I can’t say what will become of their relationship after. Well, you can never trust politicians.
Let me make something clear, no one is saying that Alhaji Atiku or any other candidate who lost to Tinubu, should not contest the victory at the courts. All I am saying is that I had expected a serious pursuit of the main case in more rigorous, pragmatic manners, based on the facts of that election. If anyone claims to have won, it only makes sense that such person will present his own figures he felt he scored to make him the winner, shows the court where he was surchanged by INEC, and shows proofs why he should be declared the winner. Not chasing shadows as we saw them did.
The live broadcast of the judgements exposed the watery nature of their cases and how undiligent they were in handling them. Eight months after the presidential election, neither Atiku/PDP nor Obi/LP has provided any single figure as what they felt was their “actual” score in that poll to make them the winner. Yet, they expected the judges to dash them the trophy. This is where the problem is. Same thing might repeat itself at the Supreme Court. When they lose now, they will begin to cry foul.
Rather than doing their homework in providing solid evidence and proving them beyond reasonable doubt, they were putting “all eyes on judiciary”, using intimidation tactics. It is like a student who did not prepare for his exams, did not write well during the exams but rather claim to be putting “all eyes on the examiner/marker”. What does he expect to get from there? Zero ofcourse.
Even in the case of Governor Hope Uzodinma of Imo state, where he came from fourth position to win, he still had the sense to gather his poll results which he felt he scored that made him believed he had the highest votes cast to be the winner. He presented them to the courts. Whether the figures were right or wrong, or whether the courts should have or shouldn’t have accepted them, are different issues entirely. I wrote against it at the time as I personally disagreed with that judgement. But, that was just my personal view. Law is law.
As we await what next will happen when the Supreme Court begins to hear the appeals of Atiku and Obi, there have been serious lessons learn in the whole process, chief which is, no matter how close you are to your friend, you should always give allowance for the day of quarrel between two of you, by not ever revealing all your secrets to your friend, especially sensitive ones that could be your ruins if they come out. Your friend might use them against you in future if you two have disagreement. May we never be grouped with traitors and wicked friends.
“Ota t’o f’oju han, iyen sepere, ore bi ota lo buru ju lo” (an obvious enemy is easier to deal with, enemy camouflaging as friend is the most dangerous). Lyrics by Late Sikiru Ayinde Barrister.
May God continue to protect us and guide us aright.
God Bless Nigeria.
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October 7, 2023.