By S.O.K. Shillings
We have been talking about a faceless cabal troubling the growth of Nigeria for selfish interests. They are the ones who choose the holders of key offices and man key parastatals. They milk Nigeria and staunt its growth. They buy and share our common heritage and colonise us within us. You cannot know the cabal. But perhaps we can trace their path.
General Obasanjo was Head-of-State 1976 – 1979. His only achievement was that he handed over power to the civilians. He did not rule for Nigeria. He was brought back in 1999 as a sop to assuage the angry Yorubas. He did not rule for Yorubas who rejected him in 1999. He did not rule for Nigeria. He ruled for the cabal. His anger with Atiku was because he was given only a paltry portion of what was stolen. One evidence of that is a parcel of land in Ikorodu known as Obasanjo land, now a subject of litigation. $16 billion power money remain unaccounted for among other monumental theft under his watch.
General Babangida and his gang bled this country white. We are still recovering from the estate of General Abacha and you can imagine what will be in the pocket of his master from gulf oil windfall.
General Buhari is an unrepentant tribalist. He is unapologetic about the lopsided appointments in his tenure. The man whose most important credential was a no-nonsense anti-corruption activistism lost steam.
Those are patriots in their own respective rights. They are victims of blackmail and subterfuge and their personal weaknesses. This system has consumed two Generals who became civil servants as Heads-of-State.
Turaki Atiku was Vice President under General Obasanjo who described what he stole under him in the most superlative vocabularies. If we want to sell Nigeria to Atiku, it must be well negotiated. He is the real cabal.
Tinubu has baggages. His certificate is under scrutiny, though, it is well known that he is well educated. His wealth is questionable even when opposition Government had nothing on him. But in spite of these, he fights on as if they were/are nothing and they become nothing. Then, therefore, I hold that he is beyond blackmail and cannot be a tool of a cabal. He is an enigma in his own class.
See a man who battles in sickness for the soul of his nation. Be he bala blu or Atiku turns Senate President, the queer system that brought so much tension caused the Vice Presidential candidate of Labour and the wife of the PDP candidate to both ask people to vote for APC.
So odd that I am supporting Tinubu. But I reiterate that there are different weapons for different wars. Tinubu fights against odds to get what he wants irrespective of the opposition. He fought the Federal Government when he wanted more local governments in Lagos. He fought his way through the APC primaries and asserted that it was his turn at Abeokuta against the sitting Vice President and he won landslide. He is already fighting the party hierarchy that is pretentiously against his interest. He is the only one in this race who has the clout to confront their future if not the past.
Then saying ‘No!’ to the cabal that has made it impossible to have electricity, good roads and a future for ourselves and children has only one route in the present configuration, Tinubu!
S. O. K. Shillings Esq., writes from Ikorodu
