NATIONAL ASSEMBLY ELECTION DEFLATES BOLA TINUBU, HIS MYTH BURSTED?

Icheoku says never in the recent history of Nigeria or any other country, has a dish of revenge been served rather so quickly, than the just concluded National Assembly election and inauguration of its eightieth session. The APC which did not see anything wrong when former Speaker Aminu Tambuwal was elected speaker of the House of Representative with the active help and connivance of their principal merger partner ACN and in total disregard of  Tambuwal's PDP's preferred candidate for the office; and Tambuwal's subsequent crossing of carpet to the APC without first resigning the office, is now suddenly crying foul that Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representative went against the APC's directive by standing for election? Icheoku asks is this a case of what is good for the PDP goose not being good for the APC gander or what; or is it a case of setting a precedent without fully being aware that like with what you wish for, you might be someday forced to equally comply with such precedent? So if Aminu Tambuwal had the APC's backing to disregard his PDP's directive, why should the APC now be seen to complain when their own member similarly disregards its own directive?

Icheoku is of the opinion that if it was good then, according to the APC's propaganda, to elect the leadership of the National Assembly based on merit and not on partisan mediocrity, regardless of the party in power's directive, it  should also be good now to similarly follow the same controlling authority? The National Assembly decided that there is greater merit in having Bukola Saraki as their Senate President and Yakubu Dogara as Speaker of the House of Representative, while rejecting and discarding the otherwise anointed candidates of the APC, so let the wisdom of the National Assembly similarly prevail now as it supposedly did before. Regardless, what is done is done and Bukola Saraki is now the president of the Nigeria senate and Yakubu Dogara is the Speaker of the House of Representatives, so all the huffing and puffing of the APC in  protest of a party's directive which was not followed notwithstanding, constitutional democracy had its place and members of the National Assembly effectively rejected imposition on them of leaders by outside unelected power brokers of the party, masquerading as party leaders. 

Icheoku commends this streak of independence by the National Assembly and hopefully they will maintain this trait in order to provide a viable guide for the new government of President Muhammadu Buhari. An effective legislature is imperative in any vibrant democracy and a legislature's leadership which emerged outside the tele-guide of the party or president will be the best to just provide that. So with North-central Bukola Saraki as senate president, Southeast Ike Ekweremadu as his deputy; Yakubu Dogara from Northeast and Yusuf Lasun from Southwest as his deputy, these tickets seem somewhat geographically balanced, especially when the president who is from the Northwest and the APC party's chairman from the Southsouth are factored in. Icheoku hopes that the new officers of the National Assembly will in oneness of purpose, help the newly elected president of Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari, provide a way forward for a nation in distress, through qualitative goal-directed legislations, devoid of crass partisanship and political gamesmanship , and which are solely geared towards finding a workable path forward and effectively engaging the forward gear for Nigeria.

As to other triggered implications of the just concluded National Assembly election, Icheoku says it effectively clipped the rather soaring wings of Ahmed Bola Tinubu, who was on the verge of morphing into an all too powerful political colossus of the APC, which intent and purpose, fueled the conspiracy to stop Bukola Saraki in the first place. Icheoku laments that the Bola Tinubu's failed gang-up against the emergence of Bukola Saraki as senate president was a power play that terribly went awry. Bola TInubu wants it all and Bola Tinubu does not want any competition at the citadel of power, hence anyone strong enough to raise his head must be brutally cut down. Bola Tinubu did not want a very powerful Bukola Saraki who he cannot dictate to manning the tiller at the senate, so a minion of his was preferred; but nothing is as good as a similarly deft political power player like Bukola Saraki and the rest of it is now mere history. Bola Tinubu, the political fox was finally out-foxed by Bukola Saraki and is now left licking his wounds. A political mortal wound from which he might never fully recover, if at all. Now denuded and unmasked, the mysticism surrounding him and which had catapulted him to the political godfather numero uno and the man running affairs of the APC, is now bound to start unraveling and eventually completely dissipate.  

Icheoku says now that Bola Tinubu's political backbone has been broken, with none of the members he preferred and anointed as leaders of the National Assembly being elected, it will be tough for Bola Tinubu to regain his clout over the APC, a clout which was almost somewhat turning him into a political legend. The other bad news for the Jagabana of Borgu-land is that the horse trading which produced different leadership at the National Assembly other than those he anointed, have greatly compromised his authority and exposed his political power as being only limited to the enclave of the Yoruba Southwest. It goes to show that Bola Tinubu wields little or no influence outside his native Yorubaland, hence he could not or was unable to arm-twist politicians from outside his Yoruba-land and make them  fall in line and kowtow his bidding. Like the former leader of Yoruba people before him, Obafemi Awolowo, Bola Tinubu might similarly end up as Obafemi Awolowo did, just a local politician who could not and did not rise above being a mere local champion of Yoruba people and was unable to transform into a true Nigerian statesman with national influence and followership. 

So with Bola Tinubu thus effectively contained, checkmated and pigeonholed where he truly belongs, a local political kingmaker of Yoruba Southwest, Icheoku says may be the opportunity has now finally presented itself for the APC to build itself into a truly formidable functioning political party and not a clannish gathering of disparate interests, some of which are beholden to just one man named Ahmed Bola Tinubu. A political party should be and is an association of people primed and geared towards capturing and maintaining political power; but not an amalgam of minions doing the bid of just one person, their master overlord. When such supposed association of persons becomes a one-man show or enterprise, with just one man dictating and determining the fate of everyone member therein associated, then it is no longer technically a political party o called but something else. This was the case of the All Progressive Congress until the latest coup de`grace at the National Assembly that moved against Bola Tinubu's continued hostage-taking of the party. Icheoku says it is a very good opportunity for members of the APC to finally take their party back from Ahmed Bola Tinubu  by sustaining the putsch against hin which will eventually see him off and over the cliff.

Icheoku had initially called for the humbling of then candidate Bukola Saraki as a payback for his betrayal of his former party and President Goodluck Jonathan. But on a hindsight, it would appear that the evil moved against and which was sought to be defeated and was defeated with Saraki's election, is far worse a greater menace than a mere hurt feelings which his desertion of the PDP foist. As with any given situation, when faced with two evils, it is always a rule of the thumb to go with the lesser of the two evils. In this case, somewhat making up with and forgiving or rather tolerating an estranged former PDP party member and help him secure the senate presidency, seemed to be a more palatable option than to allow Bola Tinubu to further consolidate his stranglehold on Nigeria with the election of his handpicked and anointed candidates for those National Assembly offices. 

Icheoku in an earlier article had lamented that Bola Tinubu is the bull in the China shop of the APC and that his obsessive greed will be the party's waterloo, its greatest undoing - the proverbial Achilles heels of some sort. A man who wants it all or nothing and you wonder if the word greedy has a synonym named ABT or is even his middle name? A conquistador of some sort, whose crave for power is maniacal; but who has now been jolted by the courageous total rejection of his anointed candidates by the National Assembly. Icheoku says it was a good deed done to the country by the National Assembly to put a break on Bola Tinubu's ravenous gulping machine of political offices in the country, because a man that ambitious might eventually put his newly found political power to a very bad use. In demystifying Bola TInubu, it has been revealed that even Robbin Hood had his own limitations and that none Yoruba speaking Nigerians have little to no regard at all for the little man from Osun State. A mini-me politician, who like "nwa-nza" the bird, does not know how very limited his political power is and that his political influence in Nigeria is somewhat strictly confined only to his Southwest Yoruba enclave. 

The other good news out of the National Assembly election is that it shows the political dexterity of Ike Ekweremadu, the long serving senator from Southeast Enugu State, who cleverly manipulated himself into relevance in an APC dominated senate, having been reelected the deputy senate president. Thankfully, former Enugu State Governor Sullivan Chime, who stood down his initial ambition to vie for Ekweremadu's senate seat, also helped enable this development because only a long-term senator like Ekweremadu could have easily achieved this feat. 

However with the National Assembly elections now concluded, the North has effectively taken full, total and complete control of all political power structures in Nigeria. The North now have the president (executive), the senate president as well as the speaker (legislature) and the chief justice of the federation (judiciary). Icheoku says this is exactly what taking "their" power back now looks like - a complete routing of the rest of the country, without the decency to at least share a bit of it? Icheoku admonishes that never in the history of Nigeria has so much powers, in short all the powers, been vested in just one, out of the three regional tripod that Nigeria stands on. Even during President Shehu Shagari era, when both the Senate President Joseph Wayas and Speaker Edwin Umezoke came from the Southeast region, the president was from the North and so was the chief judge. Ditto when President Goodluck Jonathan was president, the senate president and the speaker as well as the chief judge all came from the North; likewise did President Obasanjo and President Yar'Adua distribute powers in Nigeria among the regions. 

So Icheoku queries, were those National Assembly power horse-traders not mindful of this very delicate power balancing act requirement which still sustains Nigeria? Are these politicians not aware that Nigeria rests on a political tripod that must be gingerly maintained by spreading power structure equitably among them, hence the need to apply this factor when they decided on this lumping of all the powers only on just one leg of the tripod? Icheoku laments that what took place at the National Assembly might sound lofty and ideal and democratic in the eyes of some pontificators, especially its current beneficiary from the Northern region, but were the tables to turn, would these Northerners accept such concentration of powers only in other region and against their Northern power interest? Your answer is as good as Icheoku's; as Icheoku calls for an urgent revisit of the election in order to balance out power more evenly among the original tripod of the country. As it currently stands, Icheoku aligns self with the APC that it is "unacceptable", admitted for a different reason, for all the powers in the country - the executive, the legislature and the judiciary, to be effectively concentrated in just only the North. Icheoku maintains that it does not augur well for the country's national security interest that such a skewed disproportionate power structure distribution should be allowed to stand or remain in place in a multifaceted Nigeria; and this is not a case where cutting the nose to spite the face will otherwise make it right or cut it or justify it. In the interim, Icheoku says congratulations to all the elected officials of the National Assembly.