The unending aftershocks of hurricane Obi

As far as weather phenomena go, hurricanes have a lifespan. They pack lethal force, usually over the seas; travel at breakneck speed to make landfall somewhere to do incredible damage. Then they fizzle into lazy winds leaving their victims to pick up the pieces. That and because those who name them are not Yoruba is why they are given exotic names and have persisted this long.

When you hear of Hurricane Fiona, you think of a beautiful damsel with a figure eight form idealised by Shina Peters’ lyrics. Check its impact and you’d want to disband the World Meteorological Association (WMA) for the non-existent Yoruba linguistic council. Imagine a Yoruba climatologist baptising hurricanes the way they forename the Àbíkú/ogbanje to prevent them from reincarnating to torment their parents. Our Yoruba cousins would have christened the first hurricane that came their path by the name Èşù Làálu, daemon or Hurricane Ìkà, meaning Hurricane Wicked before calling it Kò ní wá mọ– forbidden from returning.

Peter Obi began like a gale force wind; metamorphosed into a hurricane and has left tsunamic aftershocks akin to a heavy earthquake. Before he somersaulted to Labour Party, Obi was just another presidential wannabe destined for the electoral lifespan of a comet. As the presidential polls advanced, the frugality that earned him disrespect at home became a fertiliser needed for the recalibration and regeneration of a decaying Nigeria. Like organic manure, it grew, attracting youthful flora. 

By the time the Prof. Mahmood Yakubu-led Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared the election won and lost, Obi’s hurricane only earned a bronze medal. By Olympic standards, that should be the end of it. It is not to be.

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First, Obi declared that he would contest the results. For those still capable of deciphering good from evil, all the political parties were guilty of the rigging that they accused the winning party of – in measures. Obi approached the courts for his right to launch a digital audit of the process. Pronto – unlike conventional religion that keeps the aspirations of Nigerians on voicemail, the courts granted him his request. 

Yakubu would have loved to complete the entire process so as to take a deserved rest. It was not to be. If he was to escape contempt, he must submit all his implements to Obi and Atiku’s forensic audit. Days to the conduct of the final rounds, INEC had to postpone the governorship and state house of assembly polls – the closest to the unwashed masses.

 State governors, who are the emperors of their islands and mainland and used to walking over elections with the incumbent ease of a hot knife slashing through man shanu (cow butter), had to do battle for survival thanks to Hurricane Obi. Reviewing the number of hitherto tightly held ridings that fell to Obi’s influence at the presidential and National Assembly polls, few governors have slept a wink. The ghost of the evils that many of them did have returned decked in the garment of Damocles, threatening re-election bids.

Beginning from his former home turf in Anambra where Chukwuma ‘Charles’ Soludo had tried to quench the fire of the Obi factor, to the far-away commercial hub of Lagos and across Nigeria, government houses are troubled by aftershocks. The emperors are not taking chances. Soludo is definitely afraid of the overhanging ghost of Peter Obi following the declared results of the presidential and National Assembly polls. The baritone-voiced Soludo would just wish to drown the usually hardly audible voice of Hurricane Peter Obi.

Opposing All Progressives Congress (APC) snatched all the three senatorial seats from the hands of Governor Seyi Makinde setting him off for an unprecedented radio and television appearances than perhaps any of his predecessors. When it comes to returning as the governor in Agodi, there are no warrantees as Oyo voters are known to serve the dessert of revenge as congealed dinner to those who underestimate their voting power.

By far the hottest political turf is Lagos State where, till now, Tinubu dictated who occupied government house, Alausa. February 28 changed all that when Hurricane Obi cleaned out the godfather’s ‘home’ turf.

The trouble in Lagos calls is at the centre of who is a Nigerian and what citizenship rights confer by our plagiarised and amended constitution? Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, the joker that was used to scuttle Akinwumi Ambode’s second term bid four years ago, is fighting for his political life. The battle line is drawn between those who have vowed to upturn the Bourdillon Empire and the old order to establish what they see as real people’s power and those bent on maintaining the status quo. This is the ultimate battle over who owns Eko Ile.

The last polls shifted attention from the candidates that Tinubu would not dignify by naming to a relatively unknown player – Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour. Born in Lagos to a Lagos father but singularly raised by his Ibo mother, Gbadebo’s ancestry is putting ancestry and competence to the test on Saturday. The formula that Tinubu once used to ‘naturalise’ many ‘outsiders’ into Lagos mainstream is now threatened by the politics of divisiveness.

 The Yoruba, predominant in Lagos consider the city an integral part of their homestead until the ascension of Oba Rilwan Akiolu as paramount ruler.  Like the late Mangosuthu Buthelezi, the South African Zulu King who threatened ‘outsiders’, Akiolu once threatened to drown any Ibo who blocked Ambode’s return bid. Ambode was edged out of the primaries without corpses on the Lagos Lagoon.

Last week, Tinubu the grand lord of Lagos politics took his certificate of return to Akiolu for blessing. Akiolu tends to align with historical norm that classifies Lagos as part of the Benin Kingdom. Mr Rhodes-Vivour’s chances in Saturday’s poll would either settle or reinforce many theories. For now, it has turned Sanwo-Olu into one over-active governor showing up at every event, including accepting the position of a greeter in a local church. A return ticket based on a kingmaker’s say-so is no longer guaranteed in Lagos.

To believe that Hurricane Obi only shakes the southern part of Nigeria is to live in denial. Its effect cuts across the whole nation. Obi’s allotted political bronze medal has resuscitated the ghosts of religion in national politics.

The question has always been how much religion influences Nigerians when they vote. The last time that was unofficially on the ballot was in 1993 when MKO Abiola ran with Babagana Kingibe. When the ruling APC presented the Tinubu/Shettima ticket, some Christians vowed it was dead on arrival. The results announced by INEC proved otherwise but scarcely buried the debate forever. Rather, it has exhumed the leg of a putrid corpse. With a second win on a single religion ticket 30 years apart, religious fundamentalists are up in arms.

Some winners have vowed that henceforth, it’ll be a battle of numerical dominance. Others say such a move would be potentially combustible. In Saturday’s polls and in future elections, how would the politics of identity, region and religion determine the outcome of any election? This subtle introduction of ethno-religious condiments stirred into the political soup pot might spoil the broth or crack the pot, potentially wasting the dinner – no thanks to Hurricane Obi?