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Ekiti a game of musical chairs or Russian Roulette

Finally, the days of the most divisive national political urchin, Peter Ayodele Fayose as governor of Ekiti State are now numbered. According to INEC, Fayose…

Finally, the days of the most divisive national political urchin, Peter Ayodele Fayose as governor of Ekiti State are now numbered. According to INEC, Fayose lost to Kayode Fayemi at Saturday’s blatantly monetized polls. When it comes to Ekiti and what it represents in national politics under Fayose, it is almost criminal to sit on the fence of neutrality. 

In the past six years, Fayose has become the man to beat in political infamy, brigandage and turning governance into a circus show. He is also the lowest read on the political thermometer. He is the kind of public official you don’t want your teenagers following either in public conduct, on social media or anywhere. His shameful brand of politics of chicanery has rubbed off on us as a people.

With a first term characterized by fraud and ineptitude but high on thuggery, wastage and brigandage, he was propped up by the then ruling PDP as candidate. It was a sick joke becoming reality when the federal might of soldiers, commanding officers and ministers were despatched to Ekiti to coronate Fayose. Captain Sagir Koli gave the world insights into how this was done for history.

With brute force and what he has now pioneered as stomach infrastructure, Fayose would be declared winner of that election. It was a rigged chance, but an opportunity that a right thinking person would have used to build bridges and a lasting legacy. But Fayose’s feet were too deep in infamy to get out of the bog. He opened up Government House to be thrashed by his supporters but came to inauguration with a multi-million Naira refurbished antique Mercedes Benz. 

With mindless violence, he virtually sacked the entire State Assembly, governing with six loyal members. He was the thugnor who brought a state budget to the legislature and got it passed in a few hours. Hollywood scriptwriters couldn’t have anticipated that.

With PDP luck running out at the national level, Fayose became the rallying nucleus of a new low oppositional politics. His infamous adverts warning against voting candidate Muhammadu Buhari is an epic low. Politics has not been played at that level since flag independence. Unfortunately, it turned out that Mr. Integrity, President Buhari did not come clean on the status of his health. He would spend over 100 days in a London hospital and revisit several times for an undisclosed ailment. The strongest among us are susceptible to illness and no culture or faith worth its weight supports wishing death on an opponent.

Fayose did not stop his electoral antics, he kept heckling the person and the politics of the president and to attack members of his family. He once alleged that the president’s wife was wanted in America for fraud and therefore was persona non grata in the US.

The damage done by Fayose in Ekiti would be revealed in the coming months but one thing is clear, in spite of inducement Ekiti people should be easing a sigh of relief that their tormentor is leaving. He rode roughshod on the people. One of the lowest moments of his thugnorship was the dawn visit to the State Secretariat to apprehend latecomers. In the video clip now gone viral, he could be seen microphone in hand like a village headmaster lashing out at the tardy workers and threatening them with sack. The psychological effect of that encounter would remain for those poor civil servants. He once became a tax inspector like the tout that he is.

With no clear blueprint for governance, Fayose could not pay staff salaries as and when due in spite of federal bailout. His state state remained in financial detention till date. While riding antique Benz to official functions, Fayose’s bulldozers tore down historic buildings. Challenged by the traditional ruler, he heckled him too, a cultural taboo.

With such a horrible track record, it is funny how Fayose came to think he could pick his own successor, his deputy. The scenario could have been interesting given the antecedents of other governors who endorsed their extra tires to take over from them. We would never know whether Kolapo Olusola was a Fayose clone or a man who tolerated the antics of his eccentric leader. 

It was shameful that the APC would retaliate with its own invasion of the state and alleged intimidation of voters and open monetary inducement. That intimidation caused Fayose to promise a pre-election N50k to anyone arrested by the federal authorities, a total call to total anarchy. The NBC close down of the state radio and television controversial as it was might have stopped the nation from witnessing another Operation Wetie in Ekitiland. 

It is hoped that the politics of brigandage, cant, inducement and impunity would end with Fayose’s exit. Federal agencies and their actors should forget about paying Fayose back in his own currency. It only institutionalizes bitterness. If Fayose is found to have broken the law, he should be investigated and made to face the full wrath of the law. His trial should not be politically induced. 

Fayemi, the second comeback kid is an academic. He has a lot to redeem of politics of inclusion and urbaneness for the state dubbed the most educationally advanced in the country. Let us hope that he focuses on building up the ruins and not just pre-occupied with vindictiveness and reverse victimization.

 

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