By Pius Obansa
The story of Governor Peter Ayodele Fayose is unique in the sense that he’s the first governor in Nigeria to win reelection after being impeached from office. Despite the hullaballoo generated by his nomination by the PDP as its flag bearer for the election, the controversial politician still went on to defeat the incumbent, Dr John Kayode Fayemi with a landslide.
Ayodele Fayose, Ekiti State Governor
To warm himself back into the hearts of the people before the election, Fayose had told all stakeholders that he was a changed man, he even prostrated before chiefs, obas, pastors, imams and others all in a bid to show that he had grown up from the arrogant, haughty, naive, childish and even corrupt Fayose they once knew. Of course a popular Yoruba adage says there is no how a child will be very good at eating pap wrapped inside leaf that it will not stain his hands. The elders therefore urged Fayose to go back to the Government House and sin no more.
Buying into his trademark, stone-age welfarism popularly called stomach infrastructure, the poor masses of Ekiti also thought they had found a messiah who to invest their hopes and future aspirations on.
It didn’t however take long before the stakeholders and masses realized they had fallen into what in common parlance is now known as “one chance.”
Fayose has not changed, he remains the same proud, arrogant, disrespectful and pompous man he was before his impeachment. Like a leopard that finds it difficult to change its spots, Fayose has delved into one controversy or the other, both at state and national level since the very first day he was sworn in as governor. He has abandoned governance and has been chasing shadows, fighting both real and imaginary enemies while using his army of street thugs and motor park touts to cause mayhem on the streets of Ado Ekiti.
Even though his predecessor had seized the occasion of his loss to enter the history books as the first notable politician in Nigerian history to lose election and congratulate the winner, Fayose failed to heal the wounds generated by the heat of of the election. He saw himself as the victor and his predecessor, his party members and supporters as the vanquished who must bow to his lordship or leave the world for him. Rather than settling down to begin to govern, Fayose used his first hundred days in office to lunch series of senseless social and traditional media propaganda against his predecessor and how had allegedly lived in opulence and ran the state aground.
The State House of Assembly was dominated by the All Progressive Congress (APC), but Fayose would have none of that. He succeeded in enticing and/ or blackmailing some of the lawmakers to decamp to his party. For those who he could not entice, he used the police to harass, intimidate and eventually chase them out of the state. He also encouraged this minority members to arrange a kangaroo impeachment for the former Speaker of the House of Assembly . He used seven lawmakers out of the twenty seven members in the House to pass his budget and screen his commissioners. This set of lawless lawmakers operated under the renegade governor up till the conduct of the House of Assembly election on April 11th and Fayose made life so difficult for the majority lawmakers who opposed his brigandage that they could not stay in Ekiti to campaign and return to the House.
He also took his thuggery to the courts, the temple of justice and the last hope of the common man. He was reported to have slapped a judge presiding over a case that had to do with his eligibility to stand for election, considering the fact that he was impeached, and there are corruption allegations levelled against him. He led thugs to one of the courts hearing his election case to beat up the Judge and tear up his cloths and also chase away all the staffs of the court. All these are sacrilegious and outright desecration of the bastion of justice and the last hope of the common man. Judges are revered and respected all over the world and our courts are sacred but Fayose has pissed on them.
Basking in the euphoria of his victory and with the tacit support of former president Goodluck Jonathan, Fayose took his desperation for national political relevance to an absurd level. In the days leading the March 28 presidential election, Fayose forgot that he was a sitting governor who owed the indigenes some level of performance. His campaign of calumny, death wishes and lies against Gen Muhammadu Buhari, who is now President, kept on embarrassing Ekiti indigenes.
The more he was cautioned by well- meaning Nigerians to be responsible for once, the more he was emboldened to do the needless and the more he kept on drawing attention to himself and his poor state.
Fayose behaved with impunity. He acted as if the next day would never come. He went on as if his benefactor, and partner – in- crime , Goodluck Jonathan would never return to Otuoke for the country to breathe some fresh air.
Who the gods want to kill, they first make mad. His notorious death wish adverts came out on the day Jonathan was going to launch his campaign in northwest and with the evil contents having incited northerners against the PDP, Jonathan’s reception was only made worse and his slim chance of winning some votes in the region were only made slimmer. While trying to destroy Buhari, he ended up destroying his candidate. He didn’t stop there.
While the desperado was said to be behind the fake doctor’s report which circulated online and claimed that Buhari had prostrate cancer, he was also at the PDP’s governors forum meeting in Lagos, where he continued his rabid rhetoric and demonization of General Buhari on live television. He repeated that the general was too old and that he lacked the mental health to govern Nigeria. Fayose went further to allege that at over seventy years old, Gen Buhari just like his own mother, wore pampers. Even Jonathan supporters and PDP members were outraged by that silly outburst from an uncouth governor who was given a responsibility his brains could not handle. In fact, PDP governors who were present in that shameful gathering included Jonah Jang of Plateau State and Martin Elechi of Ebonyi State who were well over seventy years old.
While delivering his tiny state which can only account for one local government in Kano to Jonathan, Fayose conspired with Jonathan’s wife, Dame Patience Jonathan, campaign spokesman, Femi Fani- Kayode and others who turned Buhari to punching bag, to deliver the entire north to the revered General.
Now the chicken has come home to roost. General Buhari against all odds has become the President. God has given victory to the righteous and shame people like Fayose who do not mean well for this country.
Going forward, since Fayose was almost impeached for the second time by the immediate past Assembly, it is not too late for him to repent and face the things for which he was elected.
For once in the history of his political career, Fayose is advised to take advantage of the third chance he has to make amends across board, heal all wounds and deal with the new lawmakers and other stakeholders as a true, responsible leader. He needs to avoid the limelight and concentrate on governance. If he doesn’t handle things with some decency and decorum this time, he may not be third time lucky.
A word is enough for the wise. A wise man hears and get wiser.
