BEWARE OF TINUBU, OMO-AGEGE AND APC, BY DANIEL NWAKOLU  

The time has come for Nigerians to do an evaluation of the unfolding process that is leading us to the 2023 election cycle. As it is with elections coming at the end of two terms, there is a lot of conversation going on among the candidates who are canvassing for votes. Claims and counterclaims, accusations and counter-accusations, bare-faced lies, unscrupulous propaganda, and other devious tools have been deployed in the ongoing process. Politicians will always have their say, but the people must be circumspect as they listen to the politicians. They must take whatever they say with a pinch of salt and subject such to scrutiny. As they examine what the politicians are saying by way of promises, abuses, and self-defence, the people must look back and reckon the contribution of the candidates to the fortune or misfortune of our country. Thankfully, the voting age is made up of a demography that can reason and ask questions. In reasoning and asking questions we are able to avoid the mistake of our recent past.

It is in the light of the above that one is compelled to review the aspirations of two candidates who have been central to the misfortune of Nigeria in the last seven years. There is no longer a single shred of doubt in the mind of over 200 million Nigerians that their country has been driven aground and that they are going through their worst experience ever. And when they think and look around they know and see the people responsible for their present ordeal and the painful thing is that instead of these people who turned Nigeria into hell to be begging for forgiveness, they are out there campaigning that they want to continue to rule and destroy us and they are boasting and bragging about it. Two among those who have turned Nigeria into a hellish jungle are Bola Tinubu former Governor of Lagos State and now the Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Ovie Omo-Agege, the Delta State APC Governorship candidate.

Both men have so much in common. They are trying to escape from a dirty past which refuses to leave them. Tinubu has been linked to drugs and money laundering in America while Omo-Agege was sanctioned for fraud and forgery also in America. Both men also have identity issues arising from their dark pasts. Tinubu has no name recognition prior to the 1970s and the records of his education have never been sighted. Omo-Agege is afraid of his old name Augustine and he is known to have tampered with evidence that erased his identity at one point or the other. These men, Tinubu and Omo-Agege are hooded men. Both of them are disasters in public governance. Forget about the lies regarding what Tinubu did in Lagos. He looted Lagos and he is still doing so. Omo-Agege as SSG in Delta State was a treasury looter who even went with cudgels to destroy file cabinets in the Government house on Sundays. As a enator, he has stolen over 180 billion naira meant for roads and the polytechnic at Orogun.

Let us now focus on how they destroyed Nigeria in the last seven years. Tinubu was among the politicians who put together the APC that produced President Muhammadu Buhari. Tinubu is credited to be the funder and pusher of the APC idea and he saw to the coalition that produced the fraud that the APC became. Buhari had in 2011 swore that he was not going to contest elections again. But Tinubu led others to wake him up from his sleep in Daura and rebranded him. Tinubu used his media and pseudo-intellectuals to mount a blistering propaganda that painted then-President Jonathan black and deceived Nigerians. Tinubu and his cohorts in the APC promised Nigeria that they would eradicate corruption, do away with insecurity and give us a prosperous economy. Today, seven years after they have given us hell instead of the good things they promised. Nigeria is the poorest nation in the world. The country is also the most corrupt and most insecure place in the world. Our people are living in bondage because of Tinubu.

As for Omo-Agege, he is a messenger-slave to the ruling cabal. He is their sidekick in the South and ever willing to do their bidding. The disgraceful picture of him kneeling down to thank President Buhari spoke so much about his servitude to the cabal. He stole the mace for them and supported the water resources bill. He also kept quiet when the herdsmen were killing his own people. He is very good at talking about “Mr. President” as if that was more important than Nigeria. At the moment he is campaigning to be the Governor of Delta State and pushing too many lies into the public space. What Omo-Agege represents is suffering that is worse than what we already have. The people of Delta State must reject suffering and reject Omo-Agege. Nigerians and Deltans must place a caveat emptor on Tinubu and Omo-Agege because both men are sick. Tinubu is experiencing debilitating health challenges, while Omo-Agege is suffering from Trust Deficiency Syndrome (TSD) and High Betrayal Propensity (HBP) which are the worst form of psychological disaster and the good people of Delta State reject that.

Daniel NWAKOLU, is a public affairs commentor