Sim Fubara and the war waged in our domot, By Osmund Agbo

This previous Friday, below the quilt of night time, two truckloads of cops, reportedly dispatched from neighboring Abia State, stormed into Port Harcourt. Their mission might have rivaled the notorious Watergate scandal of former President Richard Nixon. Performing on covert orders, their goal was the Rivers State Unbiased Electoral Fee (RSIEC) workplace. Their objective? To interrupt into the ability and seize important election supplies meant for the native authorities elections scheduled for the next day. However in a dramatic twist, Governor Siminalayi Fubara, the embattled chief of Rivers State, acquired wind of the sinister plot and refused to be a passive spectator.

The person swiftly mobilised his staff, a lot of whom are key authorities officers, together with the Chief of Employees to the governor, Edison Ehie, and the Speaker of the Rivers State Home of Meeting, Victor Oko Jumbo, together with Nationwide Meeting members aligned with him. They gathered on the RSIEC workplace, and shortly sufficient, a crowd swelled. Annoyed, the governor overtly lambasted the Inspector Common of Police, daring him to shoot. It was fairly the spectacle, and like his counterpart in Edo State, this PDP governor isn’t simply swimming towards the tide; he’s going through a tsunami of opposition however decided to face his floor irrespective of the price.

Within the farce that handed for the latest Edo State governorship election, the political godfathers handpicked one in every of their most obedient minions for the throne. After the coronation, APC nationwide chairman and former Kano governor, Abdullahi Ganduje, gleefully introduced that with their “victory” in Edo, the APC had perfected a blueprint to “win” future elections.

However this profitable method appears to have a transparent route — by means of Louis Edet Home. Godwin Obaseki, the governor who as soon as stood defiant towards his personal godfathers simply 4 years in the past, appeared unaware of this shift in energy dynamics. When he stormed the INEC workplace to problem the alleged manipulation of the election ends in favor of the APC’s Monday Okpebholo, he was swiftly proven the door. With a steely glare, DIG Frank Mba, the officer accountable for the election, bluntly made it clear that Obaseki was not welcome.

Governor Fubara should now confront an uncomfortable fact: if his fellow PDP governor in Edo couldn’t stand as much as the strain from a mere Deputy Inspector Common, what likelihood does he have towards the Inspector Common himself? 

However, the cabal might have gravely misjudged Fubara’s resolve, underestimating the drive with which he might counter their schemes. Regardless of all odds, his proxy celebration, the Motion Peoples Get together (APP), secured a decisive victory, claiming 22 of the 23 chairmanship seats. 

This triumph occurred regardless of fierce protests from the Peoples Democratic Get together (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC), together with the conspicuous absence of police safety, withheld below the pretext of a Federal Excessive Court docket ruling. Nevertheless, it’s not but Uhuru. Undoubtedly, the vanquished are tending to their wounds and quietly strategising their subsequent transfer. They’re positioning themselves with their sights firmly set on the final word prize — Fubara’s seat. Biding their time till the subsequent gubernatorial election, they’re meticulously making ready to orchestrate what they envision as Fubara’s personal “Edo therapy.”

The Inspector Common of Police, Mr Kayode Egbetokun, isn’t a person any sane Nigerian would willingly cross. As the pinnacle of the nation’s police drive, he instructions an establishment the place energy flows instantly from the barrel of a gun. And in a rustic like Nigeria, the place uncooked energy usually speaks louder than the rule of legislation, Egbetokun and his officers have greater than sufficient muscle to flex. In the event that they determine you’re of their crosshairs, it’s not an exaggeration to say that few, if any, safeguards would show enough.

However his true energy doesn’t simply lie in his management over the boys in uniform. It stems from the foothills of Aso Rock Villa, with affect just like the tentacles of an octopus that reaches each nook and cranny of presidency. In right this moment’s Nigeria, Aso Rock isn’t simply the seat of energy — it’s the entire authorities, regardless of the phantasm of checks and balances. It’s inconceivable that Governor Fubara doesn’t perceive the character of the battle he’s participating in; he’s in a proxy conflict with the true energy brokers within the Villa. To thumb his nostril on the Inspector Common is to dare the invisible but omnipresent hand of the person on the pinnacle of energy.

Egbetokun, a 60-year-old native of Erinja, Ogun State, is Nigeria’s twenty second Inspector Common of Police. His journey started in March 1990, when he enlisted as a Cadet Assistant Superintendent. Simply 9 years later, destiny aligned, and he was appointed Chief Safety Officer to the then-Lagos State governor, Bola Tinubu — a person he had met a yr earlier and who, by his personal admission, reworked his life. Egbetokun wasn’t exaggerating when he mentioned that.

When Tinubu ascended to the presidency in Could 2023, it was no shock that he put in Egbetokun as Inspector Common only a month later, changing Usman Baba. However there was a hitch: Egbetokun was scheduled to retire final month, upon turning 60. For Tinubu, dropping his trusted ally so quickly wasn’t an choice. So, a swift answer was crafted. The Police Modification Act of 2024, designed to increase the IG’s tenure whatever the civil service retirement age, was pushed by means of the Nationwide Meeting at lightning velocity.

The invoice handed all readings within the Senate with no single voice of opposition. When Egbetokun talks about who formed his life and the place his energy really lies, you’d be smart to hear.

This isn’t a person who simply holds a title — his authority is deeply intertwined with the best echelons of energy. Fubara would do nicely to recognise that he’s participating Aso Rock’s first son.

When the Governor defiantly challenged Egbetokun to drag the set off, he knew too nicely that the Inspector Common had no horse on this race; he was merely a pawn executing orders from the powers that be. It’s no secret that Fubara’s estranged godfather has tried to assert credit score for the battles the younger governor has fought since taking workplace. But we all know this battle extends far past his former boss. Regardless of all of the bluster and bravado, the godfather’s political affect and monetary sources pales compared to these of the incumbent, in a state whose month-to-month allocations dwarf these of many different states mixed, whatever the billions he might have pilfered.

Fubara’s tribulations should not about Mr Loudmouth or the potential affect of the moneyed reprobate. No, the stakes are a lot greater: they revolve round who will wield energy in Rivers State in 2028, a actuality Fubara is conscious about. However what choices does he really have? He has made numerous pilgrimages to Aso Rock, pledging to be boy and begging for the massive Oga to listen to him out, solely to be met with unattainable circumstances. 

In such a precarious place, what does a person must lose when he has been wrestled to the bottom than to fights with each final ounce of his energy. That’s precisely what Fubara is doing. He is aware of that the Calvary isn’t coming. The one various is to give up his mandate, retreat to his village, and hope he isn’t assassinated by thugs or imprisoned by the EFCC on doubtful fees.

The reality is, Fubara’s destiny isn’t in contrast to that of the remainder of us, buffeted on all fronts and witnessing the relentless assault on our dignity by the politicians and our faux leaders. It echoes the feelings of a sure Nigerian man who, ruminating on this grim actuality, posed a thought-provoking query:

“Now that we can’t take away dangerous leaders by means of the poll they usually refuse to resign, now that the navy and police oversee violence and thuggery throughout elections, and now that the judiciary persistently endorses these electoral crimes, what’s subsequent?”

Like many Nigerians, I’ve no good solutions to this vexed query. However because the late American memoirist and poet Maya Angelou as soon as mentioned: “A fowl doesn’t sing as a result of it has a solution; it sings as a result of it has a track.” Nevertheless, very like Sim Fubara, the actual query is: what can we really have left to lose by selecting to battle after we’ve already been knocked down and counted out?

Osmund Agbo is a US-based medical physician and creator. His works embrace, Black Grit, White Knuckles: The Philosophy of Black Renaissance and a fiction work titled The Velvet Court docket: Courtesan Chronicles. His newest works, Pray, Let the Shaman Die and Ma’am, I Do Not Come to You for Love, have simply been launched.