The Yoruba are all scoff and contempt for the Egbere — some creature, neither man nor spirit, clutching its tiny mat, endlessly wailing and droning, without rime or reason.
The Egbere, as riveting creature, is vivid in Yoruba folklores. But it could also be a metaphor for wailing over lost opportunities, but unwilling to admit avoidable failures.
That persona fiercely leaps out of the latest drama of former President Olusegun Obasanjo and his latest fancy of “Afro-democracy”, whatever that gibberish means.
Here is a fellow that contributed least to brewing this democracy. Despite Obasanjo subverting it at every critical point — witness his role in Gen. Ibrahim Babangida’s annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election and the propping up of the feckless Ernest Shonekan as Interim Head of State to bury MKO Abiola’s mandate — Obasanjo has had more than his fair share of state pork since 1999.
His Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library (OOPL), of rotten moral provenance, is clear proof of that skewed munificence. Obasanjo, as the boy so over-fed he called his doting parents arrant fools, from the same complex he corralled from “democracy”, now bawls “useless” Democracy must give way for his Afro-Democracy! How rich!
Obasanjo bewails his many false steps. But he hides his clear misdeeds behind some pseudo-piety. If Nigerian democracy isn’t delivering dividends, it’s due to Obasanjo’s many wilful blunders, in those first eight foundation years — 1999-2007.
Obasanjo, as president, brazenly subverted the rights of states: acting dumb as rogue assemblies, sponsored by rogue confederates, of a rogue president, sacked governors with their infamous “simple minority”, and kidnapped others to procure rogue resignations. But for the courts, Nigeria would now have been an antediluvian country, chiselled from Obasanjo’s stone-age soul
He seized Lagos council funds, hoping by that Lagos, under Governor Bola Tinubu, would collapse. As the climax of his inglorious second term, he and his Vice President danced naked in the market, ripping off the grace of their high offices. To climax it all, he plotted a third term that blew up in his face. Yet, this man wears his fake piety as some tinsel and fake jewelry.
In lamenting that democracy is not working in Nigeria — and Africa — he is docking himself as one of the past leaders — in Nigeria and Africa — that ensured just that.
For instance, how can Obasanjo waste good money on “debt forgiveness”, instead of investing that huge cash in infrastructure, physical and social, that would have fired the economy, which could have repaid those debts without fuss?
Besides, OOPL — from where he ran his mouth — is the most incriminating evidence against his person and rant. How can Obasanjo corral so much to feed his personal greed and still rant from there that democracy has failed?
This Owu fox should spare the rest of us his hypocritical rantings. He should stop distracting those clearing up the mess he created, by his “Egbere” cries.·
(Hard Ball)
