Funmi Iyanda

You know that feeling don’t you when a seemingly inane little thought or chorus line from a cheesy pop song gets stuck on auto replay in your mind all day. Sometimes it’s stuck for days but imagine it being stuck for eight years. I had that gluing and ungluing experience last week. You see, from 1999, l had had the image and print of an ALAROYE (a Yoruba tabloid) front page screech of a headline in my minds eye. After the nation staggered out of the reality of Abacha’s evil reign and lewd departure into he beyond and the curious death of Abiola into an uncertain terrain devoid of credible leaders to take us from war ruins to prosperity. Many names were being bandied about, nobody at that time was mad enough to mention Babangida but they did mention Obasanjo. I was ambivalent about Obasanjo and uninformed about Falae and all the others but the ALAROYE headline grabbed my attention and summed up the feelings of the South West as at the time. It screamed, OBASANJO KE! The true interpretation of that exclamation is as deep and prone to intuitive interpretation as the Yoruba culture itself. It expressed shock, disbelief, unbelief and outrage. It says how can you, still being in possession of your full faculties begin to even consider that.

At the time l didn’t quite understand the venom and the complete lack of support of Obasanjo in the South West having been a child in his first coming, (reading Wole Soyinka's You Must Set Forth At Dawn was illuminating)
No wonder himself and his party were roundly defeated in the 1999 polls. Don’t ask me about 2003. I no know book and don’t ask me if the fears expressed in that explanation eight years ago have been justified, the true answer to that will be unveiled in the next few months.

The truth for me however is that many times in the past eight years, that headline had flashed in my head but last week it disappeared only to be replaced by a street wide banner in red dotted all over with panicked bleeding eyes and rising uncoordinated skeletons all screeching BABANGIDA KEEEEEEEE!

This, as l watched on TV and read in newspapers the reports of babangida’s declaration of intent to be president. Yes of course l had heard all the rumours and cowardly kite flying but l did not believe that the man would actually run. For him to step out with his better life-ruining wife and actually declare an intention to run is an affront on the people of Nigeria. It is the equivalent of the recently passed on Botha declaring an intention to govern a post apartheid South Africa! Worse still is the tacit acceptance that he has a right to run, the putrid argument that we should give him a chance to repent and the odious lack of outrage at the sheer temerity. What is wrong with us! If the man has lost his mind should we not unequivocally reacquaint him with it?

Is this not the man who single headedly impoverished this nation with his inconsistent policies? Who engineered the systemic decay of our institutions and infrastructure? The one who played Tom and Jerry games with human rights running journalists aground, proscribing newspapers? In whose never ending times dissenting voices get mysteriously letter bombed or disappear, the man who dishonourably toyed with the democratic process and eventually stole our mandate and had to be dragged out of office (remember the odious stepping aside speech and ceremony where the peacock first lady glared her resentment at a stunned nation)? The man who left us with Abacha who was the same officer that mowed down over 200 defenceless civilians in a suburb of Lagos in protest of Babangidas sit tight attempts. He who cannot and has not explained the Gulf War windfall, he who took away the opportunities of my generation? BABANGIDA KE!

Our collective amnesia never ceases to amaze, after all some mad men (non gender specific please) are actually saying that Abacha’s era is better than now. I might understand that coming from the jobbers, contractors, marabous, concubines, slaves and relatives of the man but from average everyday Nigerians? Dem don crase finish.
Now why am l concerned? Why not just allow him to be roundly defeated at the polls? One, he has no right to even benefit from a democracy he worked against, should a paedophile be eligible for a job position in a school? Two, shine ya eye and read again the first two paragraphs of this piece, note also that the police IG and PDP chairman Ali accompanied him when he declared. The process so far gives enough cause for concern. Voters registration is in shambles as l write l haven’t registered and l intend to even if l have to travel to the only available point in my ward adequately armed with sleeping mat, umbrella and nutrition since there are only 1 registration point to 500,000 eligible voters in Lagos (check projectvote.org for news and reports).
Nobody should think they can foist Babangida on us, if the man wants redemption he should go to Allah who is merciful and perhaps he shall be allowed to enjoy the spoils of his reign in peace but if he dares Nigerians, all the souls of the living dead (which is what 70% of Nigeria is no thanks to the babangida legacy et al), the truly dead (especially the likes of Dele Giwa) and our ancestors will pursue him until he gets his just deserts.