Daddying onto the frontline

Since the leak of the Peter Obi-Pastor David Oyedepo audio, a storm of controversy, accusations and counter-accusations has coloured the political atmosphere, a little more than was the norm. 

But the question here is: is the leaked audio fake? Yes, according to some random Obidients who claimed to have run forensic analysis of the audio. No, according to the very credible Foundation for Investigative Journalism (FIJ). Its analysis shows that the audio is completely authentic.  

This is not the first high-profile audio leak in Nigeria. In this column, I have written about the Senator Bulkachuwa leaked phone call with one of his constituents. But the icing on the cake has to go to the Jonathan-Buhari concession call that was leaked in 2015. We have had the Atiku leaks by one Michael Achimugu and we have had clearly doctored audios like the Atiku-Okowa and Tambuwal audio, which ironically, badly done as it was, was widely peddled by Obidients. 

The other question here is what is the substance of that Obi-Oyedepo audio and what are its implication? Well, there are two things in there. Mr Obi’s grovelling to a religious leader might be very unpresidential and some might find it embarrassing, (there is a reason ‘yes, daddy’ is a trending meme) but I think a good number of Nigerian politicians have since recognised the influence of religious leaders with large followings (or even obscure babalawos) and are often prepared to bow and present their heads to be tapped and blessed while they mumble in reverence. 

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However, the major issue is the declaration of the elections as “a religious war” by Obi who was urging the priest to tailor his message to “Christians in the South West and Kwara.”  

Is appealing to religious sentiments unusual? No, not really. One could argue that it is the stock in the trade of Nigerian politics. Everything in Nigeria has the potential to become a ‘religious war.’ If you live in Jos, for example, that is even more true as a dispute over change between a tomato seller and her customer could trigger a religious riot. A football match between boys on two ends of the same street might have religious undertones. It is a weakness that has been built into our national fabric by faith leaders who explore it for their gains, one that politicians have since learned to tap into. Every politician, Muslim or Christian, has played this card at some point.  

Is Obi’s proclamation problematic? Of course, yes. Not just Obi, but any presidential candidate caught on tape saying something like that would trigger alarm bells.  

 Why is Obi’s case especially bad then? Because “Peter is better.” Or he was supposed to be. He was supposed to be different, not the run-off-the-mill politician, a unifying figure, the future, as his campaigns claimed. 

The obvious has been papered over. Obi is Obi, the same man who was in the much-maligned PDP a year or so ago. The same politician who in a campaign stop in a church, the video of which is available in the open, said “The church must be at the forefront” of the elections and concluded his address by saying “Please, church, wake up and take back your country.”  

It must be stated though that this country, this Nigeria, never belonged to any church or any mosque. It has always belonged to Nigerians, who happen to be Muslims, Christians, animists and spiritualists, even if we have been largely ambivalent about our ownership of our country. 

I understand what might have triggered Obi’s meltdown. I don’t approve of it but I acknowledge it. Of course, the APC’s Muslim-Muslim ticket might have provided fodder for it and I have spoken before about how exclusionary that was.

But the APC played a game of numbers, which politics is all about. They calculated their odds and took the risk. This galvanised already heightened religious sentiments which the Obi campaign fed into. His first weeks of campaigns were expended in visiting churches to gather support. It set the tone for his campaign. In public addresses, his message to Nigerians proclaimed competence over ethnic or religious sentiments but the sad reality is that the campaigns, especially in the northern states, have been wrought through churches and were principally targeted at Christian voters, which were already guaranteed.

The movement would have been better served appealing to ambivalent northern voters, most of whom did not turn up to vote.  

The first reaction of many Obidients to the audio had been the default response to any previous information that has irked the movement—to hang it on the APC as devious propaganda. It is a tested strategy for the movement.

Over the last year, we have seen a video of IPOB militants threatening a potential voter in the South East dismissed as being staged by the APC. This week alone, we have seen a rather embarrassing video of one Obiajulu Uja, who claims to be an Obidient, screaming on an Ibom Air flight that Mr Tinubu cannot be sworn in as president, being unruly and constituting a security threat onboard. He was eventually dragged off the plane by security as he called for Obidients to not stand by and watch. What has been the response of the movement? To disown the man and of course, dismiss him as a paid APC agent contracted to stage the drama to tarnish the movement. To what end, I wonder. 

So naturally, when the Obi-Oyedepo audio leaked, the general reaction of the movement has been to dismiss it as another APC anti-Obi propaganda. Except this time, the party’s spokesperson, Mr Kenneth Okwonkwo, went off script. Instead of outrightly denying the audio, he argued that it is being taken out of context.

Obidients did not like that he confirmed the authenticity of the audio and the very Mr Okwonkwo, who had hitherto been lionized as a hero for his pro-Obi bravado and media derring-do in interviews before the elections, is now being branded as an APC sleeper agent in the Obidient movement, a Nollywood actor who doesn’t know he is no longer on set and a desperado shimmying towards Tinubu’s camp.

In more than one social media post, he has been told to “shut up” by the same people who had only a few weeks before urged him to “ride on.” Subsequent statements from Mr Obi’s camp have come from others, not him. 

This raking of Okwonkwo’s political history to use it as a noose to hang him of course ignores again Mr Obi’s history with the PDP, to which he had belonged until a few months ago. It also demonstrates Mr Obi’s predicament. He himself had received flak from his supporters when in an interview he had said he was not challenging the results of the election but the process. Some of his supporters said they would dispense with him if he persists with such “defeatist language.” 

So, it would seem that he too has to comply with the very rigid demands of his Obidients or get the same treatment.  

No doubt Nigeria’s politics needs to move in a different direction with different actors but is this posturing, which Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka has described recently as “fascist” the way to go? (Of course, Soyinka’s grey hair, achievements and lifelong pro-democracy stand are all being rubbished now by Obidients on Twitter.) 

This desperation for change is turning toxic or has been for a while, even to its champions. It takes one slip for the movement to cannibalise its adherents. We have seen one Mark Essien, a dyed-in-the-wool Obidient, lose his credibility within the rank when he decided to spearhead an alternate result collation on Twitter from verified polling unit results from IREV. It was all going swimmingly when early results put Obi in the lead. Essien was hailed as aa hero and was cheered on.

The cheers however turned quickly when the results put Tinubu ahead, forcing the abrupt termination of the collation. Essien was suddenly dismissed as being “deep in Nasir El-Rufai’s pocket.” 

Apart from badly governing the country for the last eight years, not everything can be hanged on the APC. Those willing to institute a new order in Nigeria must grow up quickly.