THE SACK OF IWU, A CAPITULATION BY ACTING PRESIDENT JONATHAN?

Icheoku regrets that Nigeria's Acting President Jonathan Goodluck went against all grains of his thought to still fire INEC's Professor Maurice Iwu, despite expressing confidences in him and stating publicly that the ex-chairman is capable of conducting credible elections in Nigeria; and that he was not the problem militating against elections in Nigeria?

Just for the records, Icheoku is not holding fort for Maurice Iwu nor are we on his retainer-ship, but in order to hold Jonathan's feet to the fire regarding a commitment which he earlier made to himself and in front of world cameras. Query, if Professor Maurice Iwu was not the problem and is capable of conducting free and fair elections, why then did the acting president go along with those crusaders calling for the head of the ex-chairman of INEC and had it axed? The answer seems to be to placate the United States of America which desired that singular outcome, since what America wants America gets? Meanwhile the electoral officer/s that gave America Gore v. Bush 2000 is still in office and so also is the American Supreme Court that validated such anomaly?

Yet a man who did his best under the most excruciating of circumstances, successfully wresting power from an unyielding and power-drunk Olusegun Obasanjo; and effectively transferred political baton from one democratic government to another, the first time it was ever achieved in Nigeria has been axed? Icheoku asks, has anyone in America called for the trial of the deity of Otta, Olusegun Obasanjo for the mayhem that was his eight years in office? Has anyone in America or elsewhere castigated Obasanjo for micro-managing the subject-matter INEC's election result, that has now completely destroyed Iwu's career and profile? It is Obasanjo who wielded the big stick behind Iwu's head and forced him to produce or rather read out an already collated election results, which were arrived at ever before the first ballot was cast into the ballot box? But no, Maurice Iwu is a sacrificial lamb and under the bus was he thrown; now to be known as the worst election-umpire Nigeria has ever had.

Icheoku's beef with Jonathan over the sack of Maurice Iwu is not with regard to his inherent authority to so do; but that there is no basis or grounds to sack him after the same Jonathan had earlier acknowledged that Iwu was not the problem and is capable of conducting free and fair elections. The question remains, why punish an innocent man; who is still qualified to lead INEC according to Jonathan's own estimation and under the circumstances? If Maurice Iwu was a partial election umpire and was fired for this malfeasance, what should then become the fate of all those beneficiaries of his manipulated election, including Jonathan Goodluck? It is just not fair to hate a thief and at the same time cavort his loot. If one hates a thief so much as to despise him, common logic and fairness demands that such a person should not appreciate the pillage of the thief's brigandage. But here is Acting President Jonathan Goodluck, a product of Maurice Iwu's alleged electoral malfeasance, pretending to be holier than thou in firing the same man whose warped election produced his government. Icheoku asks, if Jonathan Goodluck was so disturbed by the election conducted by Iwu, why did he not decline the then vice presidency or insisted that a fresh election be conducted after Obasanjo had handed over to them? If Iwu must be sacked for the election he conducted, what happens to the wise men of the Supreme Court who later held the elections valid? What also become the fate of Jonathan Goodluck and his fellow political beneficiaries or are they going to resign and apologize to Nigerians for being collaborators in an alleged Maurice Iwu's orchestrated election fraud?

Icheoku says, it is a cruel irony to hate the hen for laying eggs and yet, savoring such eggs? If one does not like something, let him/her please completely reject it and whatever it represents or brings to the table. But it does not make sense to hate something so much and still like some other thing about it or its product? It is akin to a stone-throwing protesting Middle-Eastern boy shouting "I hate America" and is wearing a Nike cap, a Jordan's tennis shoes, a Gap T-shirt and drinking Coca-Cola to quench his thirst? It is the same logic on its head wherein a woman is condemned for having adulterous affair while the married man she had it with is exonerated; and you ask yourself wherein was the consummation or completion of the illicit affair without a culpable party?

The sacking of Professor Maurice Iwu is done and there is no amount of brooding that will make undone what is already done, so Nigeria's elections must move on without him. However, Icheoku rejects this cherry-picking of culpability and the scape-goating of only Maurice Iwu, in a motley crowd of election riggers and manipulators including Acting President Jonathan Goodluck who was installed a vice president on the orders of Olusegun Obasanjo to Maurice Iwu's INEC. Maurice Iwu was not the only participant in the election malpractice and fairness would have seen everyone who benefited from such election fraud suffer some consequence or reprimand for their roles, including Olusegun Obasanjo himself, the master-mind of the outcome and who was pulling the strings of puppet Iwu. Like earlier noted, Icheoku does not hold the brief of Iwu, but that justice would have been had in what was an apparent capitulation of Nigeria's Acting President Jonathan Goodluck to an over-bearing American influence. Hopefully this Washington's arm-twisting will end with this firing of Iwu; but Icheoku is afraid that as we reported earlier this year, the Obama administration is going full-stream and head-on to make the second coming of Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida a fait-accompli. But that is where the cookie will crumble as Nigerians will resist such selfish imposition with all they got, including protests, riots, work-stoppages and demonstrations.

Finally, the only good thing out of this Maurice Iwu's humiliating dismissal is that it sends a message to so many other would-be willing collaborators on how not to be shriveling servants of these brute politicians and army men who usually use and dump them after realising their objective. Professor Humphery Nwosu was similarly used by Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida, but unlike Maurice Iwu, he produced a credible election result of MKO Abiola's June 12th, despite the dark-wish of Babangida for him not to carry through with the election and declare its results? This makes Professor Nwosu a more respectable election conductor within the Nigeria political forum.

It is with a heart filled with sympathy that Icheoku renders its verdict on Professor Maurice Iwu, whose reputation has permanently been damaged as an election manipulator; and the man who facilitated the emergence of rogue elements, a sick president, a senate populated by 419 operators and pedophiles, a house full of fraudsters, illiterates and marauders and questionable human-beings occupying governorship offices and other elected offices in Nigeria. This is a cross he will have to carry for the rest of his natural life and which Icheoku does not begrudge or envy him about. As we anxiously wait for the 'messiah' who will finally deliver Nigeria's elections from itself, and hand to Nigerians a gift of a Ghana-type election; we pray that IBB does not or is not allowed to run in 2011; and if he runs, is not voted for; and if voted for, is not elected; and if elected, is not allowed to serve!