I
In the wake of the Kaduna train disaster, the Nigerian National team, the so called Super Eagles went ahead to produce an abysmal performance in Abuja to rightly deny themselves a place in the upcoming World Cup in Qatar.
The players had not the little decency to wear a black armband, nor offer a moment silence for the departed. Really, it’s not that it helps anything, however a nation in limbo like Nigeria could do with a little pretext of still having any shred of humanity left.
We know we’re used to gory, disaster, bloodbath and the life of an average human being mean nothing, but can we at least pretend we are humans? The popular faking it before we make it?
APC leader and presidential aspirant, Bola Tinubu reportedly immediately cancelled the much noised 13th Colloquium to mark his highly debated 70 years of existence over the Abuja-Kaduna Train Attack.
In an issued press, he claimed it was to honour the victims of the Kaduna train attack, which he said was very ‘saddening’ to him. A disaster the Federal Government refused to comment on as at then.
Millions was pumped into that supposed Tinubu fanfare, coupled with an insane PR. Now, that he cancelled it with the claim of mourning victims of the terror attack, it has increased his rating and given him a few more valuable points in the race for presidency.
Whether Tinubu is genuinely concerned about those victims and the sorry state of the nation, is a secondary concern.
The rippled effect of his recent actions is that he’s slowly buying his way to Aso Rock while the rest of the candidates dilly and dally.
He has been dolling out money in bullion vans left and right dangling his so called servitude before our nose.
I’ve been told here that Tinubu have zero chances, and for all our sake, I hope the assumption is right.
Among the candidates, he remains the one with the strongest political structure for that position yet.
And he so far has been taking the best steps. He had hobbled to Aso Rock while the likes of Peter Obi shone teeth and waited to be begged to declare. At Aso, the Jagaban had tabled his concern before the Number 1 citizen of the country. A very wise, bold and calculated move.
As a Kingmaker himself, he understands the principle of power and that elections are won behind closed doors first before the polling boot comes into play.
Which politically relevant South Western leader, both traditional and otherwise have he not met and dined with since the last quarter of last year?
Not only do he go, they are coming in too, in different disguise. Just like our embattled brother dragged himself to Lagos after being rinsed clean by Justice Inyang Ekwo )of the Abuja High Court), to wail at the feet of the political Godfather?
That’s another credible candidate to the presidency potentially lost as he must have been given a not-too-good condition to save his head.
Maybe, wait until Tinubu starts touring ala Igbo draped in well-tailoured Isiagu and our legendary Akwete, we’ll understand how serious it is as many people would be ready to buy it as they always have. You can’t help it for that’s how the human mind works.
Call this false alarm and you could be right. I am however genuinely concerned that the old man will somehow crawl to Aso Rock and if that happens, what we witnessed under Buhari could be an Eight years of child’s play.
I see Tinubu crawling to Aso Rock and unless he is stopped, he might get to sit on that big chair in Abuja.
- Enwerem Chukwuka
is the author of Godfathers