PRESIDENT UMARU YAR'ADUA RETURNS, WITH HIS GHOST BUT NOT BODY?

The missing absentee-President of Nigeria, Umaru Yar'Adua, allegedly was returned to Abuja after a very long sojourn, hibernating in a hospital intensive care unit in faraway foreign-land in Saudi Arabia? Forty-eight hours later after his arrival, no one in Nigeria has sighted him or seen his body, not even his vice president and Nigeria's acting president Jonathan Goodluck? Or could he have left his body in Saudi Arabia and a make belief Umaru purportedly in Abuja? This 'the more you look the less you see' magical return of the intubated president on a stretcher, forced one commentator to declare that 'Nigeria releaved of desperately searching for her missing president is now saddled with a phantom president?' A mirage president of Nigeria Umaru Yar'Adua - a fiction?

Remember the 'Invisible Man' movie; henceforth anyone in Nigeria wishing to see the president or have any meaningful interaction with him must have a third eye which makes ghostly apparitions visible, otherwise you are out of luck excpet you are of course clairvoyant! Imagine a head of government aka president of a country, who has been away without leave or any other reasonable authorisation for so long, in essence who had abandoned his duty post in Aso Rock, coming back after such a long absence - about 83 days, and yet did not deem it fit, as his first order of business, to address the nation or at least have a briefing with and say thank you to his vice president who has been holding forth for him in his extended absence. Now Icheoku asks, who is pulling a wool over the eyes of Nigerians on the state of health of President Umaru Yar'Adua if not the north east cabal who are now holding President Yar'Adua hostage to the seat of power, so that they can continue milking the honey pot of Nigeria? If Nigeria is a country worthy its sovereignty, the national assembly would have proactively preempted these group of selfish and self-serving Nigerians who are dangerously tasking the glue which have held Nigeria together for this long. Enough Nigerians and let everyone try to put the country above themselves; otherwise soon and pretty very soon, there may be no Nigeria for anyone to want to be in charge of?

But who elected Turai Yar'Adua to office or better still whose mandate empowers her to act as the de-facto president of Nigeria; that she should be this assertive in the presidency? When William Shakespeare penned 'Macbeth', little did this writer knew that he contemplated a Nigeria with Lady Turai Yar'Adua; who is now playing chicken with her husbands health just to cling to power. Icheoku calls on Lady Turai to remember that before her was Stella Obasanjo, Mariam Abacha, Maryam Babangida and the least goes on; such that after her, there will still be other First Ladies of Nigeria assuming Nigeria survives the present unnecessary pressure and stress she is being put to by the actions of Lady Turai and crew? A rural woman of inordinate ambition from Katsina, who never in her wildest dream, ever thought that she will someday become a first lady, now sees the office as a do or die position? The Igbos of south east Nigeria have a proverb which says, 'that those who never knew that they will ever attain the 'ozo-ship' title, when putting the ceremonial anklets, extends them all the way to their knees'; and so it is with Lady Turai Yar'Adua and her husband's presidency of Nigeria.

Once again, the entire blame of a Nigeria on a political-fork-on-the-road goes to the Otta deity, Aremu Olusegun Obasanjo for infesting Nigeria with a malignant and contageous 'Yar'Adua-isis!' Obasanjo brought this malady about when he truncated democracy and imposed a sick dying man and his power-drunk whore of a wife Turai, on Nigeria, as President and First Lady respectively! Icheoku says, Nigerians should hold Olusegun Obasanjo responsible should the nemesis called the Yar'Adau's, finally ever send the country to an abysimal point of no return where no country has ever gone and survived as one. Enough, Nigerians!

Further, what is unfolding in Nigeria at the moment has all the trappings of the deposed and disgraced former Attorney General of Nigeria Michael Kasse Aondonkaa; that on a hindsight may be allowing him to travel to Saudi Arabia through Senegal and Brazil was a political grave mistake, which has now come to haunt the acting presidency of Jonathan Goodluck? May be he should have been kept under survillance and not allowed to travel outside Nigeria, just like Olusegun Obasanjo once did with Augustus Aikhoumu, Babangida's fromer deputy? Aondonkaa surreptitiously left Nigeria after his humiliating demotion to Minister of Special Duties under the guise of a much needed vacation, through Senegal; then unto Brazil from where he jetted to his ultimate destination, Saudi Arabia? There he met with other 'co-conspirators' to force the political jack-knife of a situation, now playing itself out with President Yar'Adua being brought against his will and that of his medical doctors, back to Nigeria. The homecoming was unannounced and without any hint to the acting president Jonathan Goodluck; which begs the question, who is in really in charge in Nigeria?

It also does not help matters and cannot be easily explained away as a mere coincidence that the former governor of Delta State, James Onanefe Ibori was similarly located within that geographical belt, in Dubai, during this period Aondonkaa was making his circuitous transit to Saudi Arabia. Also, that three hundred well armed soldiers led by a Lieutenant Colonel orchestrated and managed the arrival of the 'phantom president' in the middle of the night and in a coverteous manner, without the landing lights or any other lights around the airport being turned on; and the cargo transferred into a waiting mobile intensive care unit ambulance immediately upon touchdown, and without the acting president having any wind of the whole operation tells a lot. An acting president and surrogate commander in chief of the armed forces, did not know or authorise or approve the use or deployment of the country's armed men, yet someone within Nigeria hierarchy of authority gave them the green-light and they obeyed, questions the loyalty of the command structure of the Nigerian military and calls for full investigation. Acting President Jonathan Goodluck, if ever he recovers from this frontal assault on his authority, should change all the military chiefs and deploy commanding officers throughout the country military formations since the present crop has now proved that they owe their loyalty elsewher and not to the country and her acting president! it is a national security question. Enough, Nigerians!

Icheoku has nothing against President Umaru Yar'Adua returning back to Nigeria and even resuming his duties immediately, assuming his body and soul will acquiesce him; but very resentful of the rubbishing of Nigerians by a few brash rascals who would rather the cricket mound is decimated rather than not catch the cricket? Like one of the two women before biblical King Solomon, they demand that the baby be cut into two halves! It would have been much easier for the polity if the north could serve out its arranged eight years term and yield way, without all these heart-racing. But humanity does not control nature including its right to make anyone sick and indisposed; but can't the north defer its eight years or whatever is left of the almost now over, four years of their presidency to another time in the future? Or is Nigeria going to hell in a hand's basket that they just want to get all they can get before the Titanic takes further water or the African clay-foot giant assumes room temperature?

Icheoku seriously believes that majority of Nigerians do not want to remain Nigerians and in the same country, otherwise necessary sacrifices and accommodations would have been made by all the sectional tribes especially the northern Fulani-Hausas in order to allow the country move forward without the unintended Umaru Yar'Adua's speed-bumps. But no, everyone is at each other's throat, demanding the first shot at Aso Rock and forgetting that there is only one presidential chair therein and that two captains cannot be on the same one ship. Nigeria can only either have a fully recovered and viable President Umaru Yar'Adua or an acting President Jonathan Goodluck at this time; but nothing less or more in order to ensure that the elastic band holding Nigeria together does not to violently snap with its unintended consequences. The military should also understand that no matter how tempting it may sound to emulate their neighbors up north in Niger Republic, that coups are no longer so cool and that Nigerians experiences under Babangida and Abacha makes that option a sour unpalatable grape. Admitted that the same bunch of human excrement and scumbags that queued up to offer Jonathan Goodluck their congratulations will be falling over one another to be the first to tell the military 'good to see you!'

The possible resolution is for the national Assembly to endeavor to have audience with the returned physical body and sound-mind of President Umaru Yar'Adua; and confirm for themselves that he is still cognitive and has enough vitality to finish his term in office. If not, they must courageously confirm Acting President Jonathan Goodluck immediately to a full president and let the chips fall where they may. Icheoku says, it is their wish-washy pandering tendencies that have left Nigerians in the lurch regarding the political authority in today's Nigeria. Just impeach the president on grounds of ill health induced inability to continue in office and close that sorry chapter of Nigeria's political pupillage. However, the best and most desirable option would be to peacefully let the country unravel and yield to its pre-independent status or better still pre-1914 amalgamation; barring a national soverign conference to decide its continued existential terms and conditions. Sorry, if we sounded despondent, it is just that Nigeria has a lot of potentials which is not being properly harnessed for the greater good and the south is death-tired of the arrogant north, continually and without ceasing, arrogating to themselves the right to perpetual ruler-ship of the Nigeria state and bestowing power over Niger Delta oil to whomever it choses, including Theophilus Danjuma. Enough, Nigerians! Please Turai cabal, let Nigerians see or hear from their 'lost but found' President Umaru Yar'Adua!