Fallouts from a fraudulent party convention

According to Wikipedia, Secondus is the Latin word for second. It could also mean ‘favourable’ or ‘lucky’. However you apply it, Uche Secondus is, very well, Secondus. He is favourable and twice lucky. At 62, he has been acting chairman, of his party’s working committee and later its substantive head. On December 10, he was crowned chairman of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) or, if you prefer the nom de la rue – the Party of Desperate People. 

Of course the PDP was in government for 16 years leaving a monumental landmark of corruption, ineptitude and cluelessness. Yorubas say that the name a child is given pilots its destiny. This is the party that made both Vincent Ogbulafor and Ibrahim Mantu failed prophets. Both men had at different times boasted that their party would ruin Naija for sixty years. As a result of Naija people’s heckling of the forces of heaven, the angel in charge of interpreting political wishes thought he heard sixteen and pegged the misery at that. The party’s Siamese twin has not fared better if you ask people.

The Yorubas were right; Secondus’ name has properly directed his destiny leaving them to lick their wounds in isolation. Last week, a Yoruba youth caucus demanded an apology from their party failure, which they promised to kill and bury its fortunes in their land. With six chairmanship aspirants of Yoruba stock to the convention they were all zoned out when they showed up at the Evil Square, venue of the convention. It was a civilian coup the sort of which, only the PDP is capable. 

There were those who decried the delegations fielded by representatives of the Oodua nation for the convention. Bode George who now describes himself as a patriot and almost wrestled the title of Generalissimo from Ganiyu Adams in his passionate withdrawal statement, appealed to the ethnic juices of his people. He recounted the history of the bygone years in the characteristic way sore losers attempt to appeal to ethnic sentiments after a well-deserved shellacking. George, a pardoned ex-con demanded an apology from Nyesom Wike, the authentic Generalissimo of the PDP who urged delegates to ignore the Yorubas because they have never contributed anything meaningful to the party.

Poor Yoruba race! Having raised the likes of Obafemi Awolowo, Adekunle Ajasin and even Bola Tinubu, it was a sad day when ex-cons make their first eleven in a political match. George was not the only Yoruba who jumped ship before being thrown overboard, Gbenga Daniel, who answers to the title of Otunba, in another demonstration that current Yoruba title-peddlers did not take Hubert Ogunde’s classic, Yoruba Ronu to heart also withdrew. Tunde Adeniran, who vicariously lost a US ambassadorship position to the charges leveled against his son equally stepped out of the convention centre with his dream unrealized. Other paperweights left with their tails in between their wobbly legs.

Without any credible evidence in the age of social media, losers swore that it was money that elected people at the PDP convention and not delegates. Wike, the mercurial governor of the oil-rich Rivers took no prisoners. He left the so-called bride of political alignments shivering at the altar as the groom left with his new partner.

According to usually unreliable news, Digbolugi Ayo Fayose was accused of pocketing the very generous dollar allowances allotted to all the 92 delegates from Ekiti State. The rumourmill alleged that each delegate to the convention went home with $10,000 or N3.6 million. Fayose did not want too many rival madmen in Ekiti, so he allegedly collected the entire delegate’s share and issued them freshly-minted N50,000 each. This is nothing new, after all the Ikoyi whistleblower was saved from trouble when the federal government decided it was better to pay him in Naira to prevent him from having a heart attack. He has since collected his stash and flew out to yonder climes. Nevertheless, some say that Fayose has now earned a new sobriquet – Ebora to n je dollar deligeti – literally, the daemon that swallows delegates’ dollars!

The convention has come and gone and PDP has remained the same. Nothing was said about repositioning the party. No apologies for the waste of sixteen years. No signposts of what the party has in store. No amendment to the party manifesto or its discredited modus operandi/vivendi – just typical Naija convention cankerworms repositioning themselves for proximity to power in readiness for the ultimate kill. 

For all his righteous indignation as the last pure Yoruba, Bode George has described news of his resignation as BoT member as the fabrication of those suffering from ‘chronic helplessness.’ Apparently this man loves his race and would sacrifice anything for the preservation of its honour and glory except the perks and privileges attached to his political positions. Naija people do not like suffering, but in 2019, they would forget the state of ruderlessness they’re currently in and vote for stomach infrastructure – an apple hardly falls farther from its tree.