HOPE 1965 WESTERN REGION IS NOT RETURNING TO NIGERIA FROM RIVERS STATE

The political crisis tearing Rivers State into shreds today, which is most likely to become Nigeria’s doomsday affair, if care is not taken, did not start from the Nigerian General election of February and March 2023. It predated it.

Its genesis started somewhere inside the Moshood Abiola National Stadium in Abuja, during the presidential Primary of the People Democratic Party, when the Party set out to pick a candidate most qualified to be the presidential candidate of the Party in 2023, general election. And that was May 27, 2022.

Atiku Abubakar; former Vice President to Olusegun Obasanjo, won – but not without intrigues of fraudulent manipulations anyway. These manipulations included, mainly purchasing of delegates with American Dollars – which made the money factor to hold more than Eighty percent of the “rules of the game”.

Other factors of tribal and religious sentiments dominated that exercise most faithfully, as the phone call that went between former President Ibrahim Babangida and former Governor of Sokoto State, Aminu Tambuwa, shall always remain a sad reminder of the wicked side of the Nigerian political game.

Atiku Abubakar however won – crook or hook.

While in the other hand, Nyesom Wike, then Governor of Rivers State, became the major loser of the PDP Primary. And the “big man” from Rivers State, and who had dominated Rivers State’s politics like and Octopus for years, had, before the 2022 Presidential Primary, invested so much money in the PDP. It was an obvious fact that he was, and most likely remaining till this moment, the financial livewire of that Political Party – the PDP.

It wasn’t not with his money, but the Rivers State’s people’s money. He spent it then anyway, and still spending it today.

It therefore will be convenient to say that the loss and gain of that day – May 27, 2022, began the battle that has returned Rivers State to the “National Stadium of Hell”. And this is becoming a one dangerous journey that is most likely to take Nigeria along.

God forbid bad thing that Nigeria is not consumed in the movement. But before God comes in, to rescue Nigeria, the man that God has given enablement to take over political leadership of Nigeria now, must understand a “role-function” created for him by the same God that made him Nigerian leader.

So, the following message from the past of our national history below, is meant for President Bola Tinubu – and that is if he has forgotten the journey of 1965’s Western Region into the marketplace of Nigeria.

I pray that I have the full attention of President Bola Tinubu as we navigate this historical perspective voyage of discovery.

The Western Region of 1965 that produced “Operation Weti e” did not come because Obafemi Awolowo was physically around the people at that time. The man – Obafemi Awolowo, had earlier been sentenced to prison on September 11, 1963. So, it was not the presence of the man that made what happen in 1965 happened. It was the injustice that characterised the general election of 1964, with its gradual built-up, that brought us to the waterloo of 1965, until it eventually brought in a collapse of an era, on January 15, 1966.

I want to posit that this history should remain fresh in our memory. Or it ought to be. It means therefore that going by the documented evidence of that era – the fallout from 1963 to 1965, before 1966; the year of the inferno, every political adult in Nigeria should have seen that hand of political disaster rising from the Coaster State of Rivers, with terrible Tsunami, following.

Unfortunately, political ego of a few individuals in any given society, at most times, would not allow them to admit what is politically good for the society in question.

What are the issues that led to truncating our democratic race of the past era? Let us name them as causes of the 1964 election. They are simple and few.

1.?????? Inordinate of Crisis

2.?????? Inordinate ambition for power on the part of all political parties

3.?????? Inter and intra party rivalry

4.?????? Intimidation of opposition politicians who were denied fair contest in elections.

Then let us look at the causes of 1965 problem before an attempt in prophesying into what might likely happen in today’s endeavours.

1.?????? Western region citizens were bitter that Chief Obafemi Awolowo was in prison

2.?????? It was believed that the ruling NNDP wanted to retain power at all costs

3.?????? Opposition candidates were not given equal opportunity to contest the elections.

Are these malfeasances not so relevant in todays’ Nigeria? Then, Samuel Adegoke Akintola, the former Deputy Premier of Western Region, under the Premiership of Obafemi Awolowo, found a very sweet and cozy ally in the person of Sir Ahmadu Bello – then Premier of Northern Nigeria.

?That was when Samuel Akintola (Deputy Leader of the Action Group) broke away to form the Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP), and immediately caused his new party to form alliance with the Northern People’s Congress [NPC]. The alliance was called Nigeria National Alliance [NNA).

Today, Nyeson Wike; who admitted buying contesting forms for all PDP politicians that contested for all the political posts in the 2023 general election, has demonstrated that he is the Political Supremo of Rivers State, including his ability to return all PDP members to their chosen offices during the general election, while at the sometime, divert all the presidential votes to favour the candidate of the opposition party – the APC, who is now the President of the Federal Republic.

Such abracadabra shall remain a fervent study case for future students of “Election Rigging”, if any University, in the future, might want to introduce such faculty. But for now, it is worth being fully compensated – from the president to the former governor. But at what cost? Will it worth it at the end – given all the anticipated and articulated calamitous casualties?

The romance between President Bola Tinubu and his Minister of Federal Capital Territory – Nyesom Wike, for now is quite tantalizing and mesmerizing, and for obvious reason of course. Yes, Wike has “quaked” his own Political Party [PDP] to rumble of ashes – courtesy of Nigerian money, which all of them are wasting anyhow until nemesis shall catch up with them, and of course all POWERS in the country are now properties of one man.

In a few days’ time [in Wike and his benefactor’s calculation], Minister Wike’s godson; Governor Siminalayi Fubara, could be impeached, again, courtesy of the powers that be, and the Nigerian jaundiced judiciary, and if that happens, can it erode the memory of 1965?

There was such romance before, according to the story of Samuel Akintola and Sardauna of Sokoto told above.

Today’s Nigerian leadership should therefore look beyond the sweetness of today’s romance into that dark tunnel of the unknown and take one positive decision: Nigeria to be or not to be?

Why can’t we consider that Nigeria’s future should take priority over our myopic narrow interest?

And that the Almighty Jehovah God; the Creator of Heaven and Earth [all men and women], including Wike and Fubara, has the supreme Right and Authority of putting an end to every activity of men, including the evil game plans of current leaders!

Godwin Etakibuebu; a Veteran Journalist, wrote from Lagos.

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