Ladoja And The Politics Of Hope
Engineer Ladoja “former” governor of Oyo State has not changed the impression he had made people to believe of him. The impression is that he is a pacifist, a man with a contrite and forgiving heart and spirit, a compromiser, a patriot, a nation builder and what journalists called “ a man willing to dine with the devil and eager to appease his mentor, Alhaji Lamidi Adedibu”.
It is no longer news today that Adedibu, Ladoja’s estranged godfather had been a thorn in the neck of Ladoja since his inception of office, the just ended dispensation, as the governor of Oyo State.
Adedibu did not just came up to torment Ladoja by the single act of helping the default legislators that illegally impeached Ladoja out of office for a period of eleven months, but Adedibu power to do that could be traced to the presidency which Chief Olusegun Obasanjo headed.
Obasanjo who professed getting rid of corruption in the country when he was president dined with corruption himself by not daring to arrest the Oyo crisis fomenter, Adedibu. Obasanjo did not call him to order even when the INEC voting machines were allegedly found in Adedibu’s house. Obasanjo and his PDP kept deaf ear in all atrocious deeds of the self-acclaimed Ibadan politics henchman, Adedibu. But they opened their ears and eyes looking for even a pardonable act to nail Ladoja. Does this mean that some people are above the law in Nigeria?
Ladoja is in court now demanding completion of the tenure he was illegally impeached by Otunba Alao-Akala-led uncouth legislators. But it is gruesome to note that PDP is saying that Ladoja has no locus-standi or right to seek for such, claiming that Ladoja collected all his entitlements immediately he was later re-instated.
If PDP is now saying that, they are not getting it right. They forgot one thing! They forgot to arrest Akala for carrying such an illegal impeachment against a sitting governor. This act is gluttonous! Since PDP allowed Akala to go free, it behoves anybody to say that corruption is part of PDP’s manifesto. Akala’s single act with his partner in crime, Adedibu did not only bring shame in the country but made Nigeria look irresponsible and incivility before the international community.
On Monday May 7, 2007 the Peoples Democratic party (PDP) under the captain of garrison commander Adedibu announced and commended the expulsion of governor Ladoja. As if that was not enough crime, PDP also joined issue with other people believed or perceived to be consolidating to Ladoja. The prominent chieftains that received the hammer of the party’s extra-ordinary meeting that took place in the party’s secretariat located on Queen Elizabeth Road, Ibadan are former Deputy national Chairman (South) of the party, Alhaji Yekeen Adeojo, former Chairman in Oyo State, Chief Michael Adegbite, Alhaji Hafeez Tijani, and Chief Yetunde Ajibola Azeez.
In Ladoja’s administration some colossal figures were hammered too. They are the Secretary to the State Governor (SSG), Mr. Ayodele Adigun, the Chief of Staff to the Governor, Mr. Sarafadeen Abiodun Alli, the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Adebayo Shittu, and the Special Adviser to the Governor on Security and Protocol, Mr. Bola Alphonso.
When concerned observers of Ibadan politics wanted to know why the party showed these people the way out of it, PDP shamefacedly said that their expulsion was based on an allegedly “anti-party activities and acts of indiscipline before, during and after the last general elections”. Nigerians know who was the architect of all the katakata in Oyo State, if not emperor Adedibu. PDP gave Ladoja a bad name to hang him at stake. But Nigerians know that if there was any cool headed governor in Nigeria in the last dispensation, that governor “was” Ladoja.
PDP under the new image of the former president of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Aremu Obasanjo hated Ladoja just for no justifiable course. Obasanjo hated Ladoja for what observers called Ladoja’s perceived apathy towards the President’s much-coveted third term project as well as the presumed affinity between Ladoja and the former vice President Atiku Abubakar.
In 2004, Adedibu who is making noise now was humbled and he lost his political muscle. It was Obasanjo who made him crop up to be a tool that was used to fight Ladoja “for not pitching tent with the third term group”. Obasanjo applied all political chicaneries illegally and humiliated Ladoja.
How humble Ladoja was, he went to Abeokuta, alongside Governors Gbenga Daniel (Ogun), Segun Agagu (Ondo) and Olagunsoye Oyinlola (Osun) to show his sincerity heart to Obasanjo that he was not harbouring any evil against him. Alongside these dignitaries with Ladoja, Obasanjo did not respect the human integrity. What he did was to tell Ladoja to resign. Obasanjo vowed that he must remove Ladoja from the office. But if Ladoja were a renegade he would have called Obasanjo names just the way former governor of Lagos State, Alhaji Bola Tinubu and his Abia State counterpart, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu did. But Ladoja kept his peace and hoped!
While the culprits that made Ibadan unstable in the last four years are left to mount the saddle of power as kingmakers and governor, Ladoja now becomes the scapegoat that PDP used for a text-run. The Lucky Obasanjo that made Ladoja an unlucky man in his political career in the Nigeria’s violent political institute has bowed out from the office but his evil relics are yet to go.
His successor, President Umar Musa Yar’Adua could not be one of Obasanjo’s mammoths of evil relics because he represents a new Nigeria where peace, justice and respect to the rule of law are envisaged to reign supreme. Yar’Adua could be a nice man and Nigerians want him also to be a nice president.
According to media reports, Yar’Adua was modest. As governor of Katsina State then, he could even wear a clothe for two days. He goes to the street alone to buy a stick of cigarette, which no government official in Nigeria could dare.
Yar’Adua being a humble and a truthful person, should use his position as the No. 1 citizen of the federal Republic of Nigeria to influence and make sure that Ladoja’s matter of tenure extension that is in the court has a humanface.
Being a politician of hope Ladoja is, he is a man who believes in justice and the rule of law so much. He won his political detractors in court last time he was illegally impeached. He is a man who meant well for Oyo indigenes by fighting to see that Ibadan was not loosed to the grip of political demagogues in Oyo State headed by Adedibu, but the ‘Almighty’ Obasanjo never allowed him.
There is no well-informed person of Ibadan politics that did not know that it was when Ladoja was serving the illegal impeachment that Adedibu helped Alao-Akala to pocket the PDP guber ticket of Oyo State. Now, if all the well-meaning people of Oyo State could rise-up against this dastardly injustice meted out on Ladoja, there is every tendency that Oyo will know justice once more. Because, PDP is saying that Ladoja has collected all his entitlements as soon as he resumed office after the impeachment. The question here is, did PDP retrieve the ticket Alao-Akala pocketed in the absence of his governor? No. And this shows how illegal Alao-Akala’s emergence as the governor of Oyo State is.
If Oyo indigenes still hope to see good governance – that hope could be realized when they support Ladoja to attain his mandate in the court on June 14.
Odimegwu Onwumere
Oyigbo, Rivers State, Nigeria.
Mobile:+2348032552855
