Date Published: 03/20/10

MARCH, 16TH BAFARAWA’S FOLLY By Emeka Maxwell

    Desperation has since occupied a substantial portion of the remnants of the dislodged DPP; Bafarawa and his rudderless flock of supporters have demonstrated their unbridled lust for power.  They have tasted power, mis used power and misappropriated power for Eight years and they want to regain power at all costs.  Lust for power has blinded them and have thus forgotten that this is a democratic dispensation which runs on majority and not minority.

2.    Bafarawa and his people thought that they could again ride on the crest of power without winning any election; this is not only ridiculous but absolutely zany.    Yes, they have traversed the corridors of almost every court in the land on a wild goose chase searching for power which in the first instance they never merited.

3.    Desperation is akin to psychological blindness that is why DPP supporters were all over the place spreading rumors that 16th March was their day, that the Appeal Court Sokoto division would transfer power to them.  Laziness is equally the pastime of never do – wells.  It therefore did not pose any surprise as the DPP Camp was already in a festive mood days before March 16th.

4.    Their sense of imagination must have been eroded by sheer desperation; this explains why they rushed to town with all manner of attitudinal anxiety.  Seat of the Caliphate was to have turned into a sort of a battle field in the bloody imagination of the DPP People; they schemed to unleash terror and mayhem on innocent citizens who did not identify with the evil intention of Bafarawa and his co-travelers.  But have they suddenly forgotten that, governance is only tenable when people are willing especially in a democracy.

5.    Again, if they should raise dust and clamp down on the citizenry, who would they govern? Maigari Dingyadi and saner  people like him in the DPP should tread softly because Bafarawa is a dying horse and is only gasping for breath.

6.    In his present State, Bafarawa can do whatever he could to jeopardize the progress     of Sokoto State; he will never succeed.

7.    See the advertorials placed by the DPP in some national dailies pre-emptive of the Appeal Court Judgment, simply, they have gone gaga.  Alas!  The much talked about judgment was not to be and all the scheming and castles so far constructed in the air turned out to be an extended version of the Bafarawa folly.

8.    In their blind anticipation, the DPP people were reported to have formed a tentative cabinet and penciled a number of individuals for particular treatment for their sinful “Involvement with the Magatakarda Administration, well, they did plan, God planned and He is the best of plotters.

9.    One is pushed to wonder, what could Bafarawa and his people do without support from the people they are desperate to put into slavery again?  Without falling back on what happened in the Eight years of Bafarawa misrule, it is not overstating the obvious to equate those Eight years to reign of horror and slavery.  I keep on pointing at Bafarawa because Maigari Dingyadi is just a façade; a willing tool in the sailed hands of Bafarawa.

10.    Constitutionally one needs not to see Maigari as a sinner as he has been running from pillar to post in his desperate quest for power, but the destructive attitude and posture of Bafarawa and his people is what cause qualm to the peace – loving people of the state.

11.    Peace, live and let live should have been the mantra employed by Bafarawa and his supporters.  It is totally wrong for them to design to rule over a battlefield, and they say they are taking Sokoto State to another level.  How?  Will Bafarawa through Maigari govern over a cemetery or how would they live to tell the story either?

12.    My grouse with DPP and its people stems from their overwhelming disdain for power and thirst for destruction.  Many public buildings and private residences were slated for destruction either through arson or outright vandalization.
     
13.    I repeat here that Bafarawa is like a dying horse, having suffered a myriad of setbacks he is hell bent on taking his pond of flesh from Sokoto and its people who wronged him by wresting power from him.

14.    Bafarawa is still cantankerous to assume that he can wriggle himself out of the EFCC dragnet just by securing Maigari Dingyadi as the State governor.  It is true that during his 8 year grip on the states resources, Bafarawa visited brigandage and blatant misappropriation of funds.

15.    The over One Hundred charges of corruption against him at State High Court are just a tip of the iceberg. It is not fiction; it is real, all those allegations of sleaze were indeed committed during his administration, it is this same looting galore that DPP and its people want to carry on with.  The God of Abraham and Hannah will not translate their morbid dreams into reality.

16.    Members of the resident communities like me cherish our stay in Sokoto for its age – long peaceful nature and again for the Magnanimity of Aliyu Wamakko especially in allowing our children to enjoy free education.

17.    No body is against Maigari as a person but his unholy alliance with Bafarawa to cut short the glory of the state is nauseating and this has branded them and their DPP as enemies of the State.

18.    It is myopic how some newly posted officers took a tour of the offices they were assigned before the fabled March, 16th. It is unimaginable the aura of desperation which DPP people exuded and even the totality of massive destruction they hatched to occasion on our serene State.

19.    When has eagerness turned to heartlessness?  We are happy that God in his infinite mercies, has once again turned the tide against Bafarawa and DPP.  Since they failed to win elections twice, they resorted to all sorts of methods to regain power by clinging to more technicalities.  Somebody should please help me and ask Bafarawa why did he in the first place, allow power to escape his grip.

20.    Has Bafarawa forgotten how he ruled Sokoto State for 8 years stepping on toes and trouncing his opponents roundly?  He remained seemingly unstoppable because it was his own prime time.  Let him be reminded that history has a salient way of repeating itself. Today as far as the politics of Sokoto State is concerned, it is Magatakarda’s prime time.  Bafarawa and his DPP cannot do otherwise; besides, the courts have spoken a number of times and Wamakko emerged triumphant.  When next again they speak, Wamakko will still by God’s power emerge triumphant.

21.    Bafarawa should revisit his memory and recollect how the good people of Sokoto State accepted him over and above other well meaning and better placed candidates in 1999 and 2003 elections. Probably this will help him to appreciate the essence of time and the urgent need for him to recoil into his shell, concentrate on his charges of looting before the State High Court filed by the EFCC and resign himself to fate.



Emeka Maxwell
Offa Road
Old Airport
Sokoto