Last week, President Bola Tinubu finally showed Nigerians where his sympathy lies in the long-drawn battle between the Minister of the FCT, Mr Nyesom Wike, and his estranged godson and governor of Rivers, Siminalayi Fubara.
Apart from the President and his benefiting All Progressives Congress (APC) party goons, everyone else knows who the aggressor is and who the victim is.
However, for political convenience and expediency the APC and its supporters and sympathisers are pretending not to know that while the victim is being vilified, the aggressor is being enabled and empowered. If not for anything, because a weakened and pliable leadership in Rivers State is the only way they can continue to have control over the state, even though it is a PDP state.
Therefore, in the eyes of Tinubu and APC and their sympathisers, Wike has no hands or guilt in the conflagration that has engulfed Rivers. For them, Fubara who is only fighting for his life is the aggressor and guilty party.
Let’s be clear here. There is no doubt that Wike made Fubara governor. That is not open to debate. Fubara owes Wike eternal gratitude for making him Governor. So, did Fubara betray Wike by seeking to ditch him after making him Governor? Absolutely. But, pray, is this the first time we are experiencing this in our polity? No. And will it be the last? Certainly not.
Talking about betrayers, is there any in the country that is worse than Wike? I can’t think of any. If you can please help me out. Everyone who played a role in Wike’s political life from his first day as a politician to this day, has been betrayed, abused and humiliated publicly.
So, those who insist that Wike is right to pull down Rivers state and ground governance just to even score with Governor Fubara are they unaware of these facts or are they just playing the ostrich?
Only hypocrites, sycophants, and those who have chosen to hide behind a finger can, in all sincerity, claim that Wike does not deserve what came to him. After all, it is said that whatever goes around comes around.
President Donald Trump on assuming office for his second term as President of America told the world that with his magic wand he would end the conflict in Ukraine in no time.
However, the way he is going with a prejudiced and biased approach to resolving the conflict, he might as well inadvertently hasten that doomed third world war, which he accused his predecessor of.
How do you go into conflict resolution with a mind made up and your biased public knowledge?
Like Tinubu, Trump unabashedly heaps all the blame on the victim while the aggressor, Putin, is made to look innocent in a war that has exposed the overrated Russia for who they truly are.
Only Trump does not know that the war in Ukraine is precipitated by the unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. So, while Trump bares his fangs on the victim, Volodymyr Zelenskky’s Ukraine, he gives Putin the latitude to continue in his madness.
Trump sees Zelenskky as a despot and has been calling for an election in Ukraine as though Russia under Putin is a democracy. In the eyes of Trump, Putin is a good democratic example to follow. Trump is insisting on an election in Ukraine, with a fifth of Ukraine under Putin’s Russia, so Putin’s puppet can be installed as President for Putin to manipulate. For Trump, Putin and our own Tinubu, might is always right!
Tinubu addressed the nation last Tuesday on the worsening state of things in Rivers. He blamed everyone except the aggressor. He reserved the roughest part of his tongue for Fubara but conveniently ignored Fubara’s tormentor-in-chief.
No fair and unbiased observer will do that. In the first place Fubara’s fate was not made any easier by his decision to withdraw his suit in court after the intervention of President Tinubu and that singular action was his undoing.
There are usually two or more sides to a conflict and there is no denying the fact that Wike is all out to prove his might and his importance and relevance to the future political aspirations of President Tinubu.
That’s what this is all about. Only those who are wallowing in self-deception, hypocrisy and sycophancy would have a contrary opinion.
Now President Tinubu has imposed emergency rule on Rivers for six months, at the most and also suspended Governor Fubara and his executive and the state assembly for the same period of time. For him, suspending Fubara is the path to a lasting peace. Nothing can be farther from the truth.
While Fubara is punished, Wike who is behind the defiant 27 state legislators led by Martins Amaewhule is not reprimanded, and he is still sitting pretty as FCT minister with all the resources available to him to foment trouble and cause collateral damage.
Of course, the biggest victims are the people of Rivers. They are the very same ordinary people that President Tinubu and his belligerent FCT Minister would return to next year when politicking heats up towards 2027.
Does Tinubu think that this measure of his is the right one or is he just not interested in the possible backlash that may follow? For heaven’s sake, Wike has just one vote in Rivers, and he does not enjoy the monopoly of violence.
Tinubu should rein in Wike if he is sincere. Wike had served his tenure and his successor Fubara is the elected governor of the state, he must be allowed to serve out his tenure and only the electorate should decide his fate.
Wike must be made to decide whether he wants to do his job as FCT minister or be asked to quit.
Who among those blaming Fubara for standing up against an impending doom would have done otherwise if they were in his shoes? Were they expecting Fubara to sit back and watch the Amaewhule group impeach him without a fight?
If as it is rumoured Tinubu is interested in Rivers State, the best way to go about it is by doing what is right and just so he can approach them for their votes in 2027.
This trajectory or route that he has taken is wrong because come 2027, he and Wike would be up in arms not only against Fubara but also all the many enemies Wike has attracted to himself.
So, like Trump who is inadvertently strengthening Europe through his bias toward Putin, Tinubu would also be facing more resistance and opposition from the legion of enemies that Wike has created for himself.
Can Tinubu identify this minefield that lay ahead and make a detour or is he bent on threading this path?
How does it even sound that a man who has spent all his political life opposing the military is today replacing an elected governor with a retired military officer? If Wike is still keeping his job, then Tinubu has no reason to suspend the governor and the legislators. If Wike wants the crisis to end today, it will.
Sadly for Nigeria unlike in the US, there will be checks and balances to curtail the excesses of Trump but for us, this is not the case. Our national assembly are choristers led by choir masters who dictate proceedings.
For Tinubu, like Trump, is it also just a case of might always being right?
