Reuben Abati
It was about 6.00 am when I heard knocks on the gate. It was as
if someone wanted to bring down the gate to the house. Gba! Gba!
Gba! Gbaga, Gbaga! It was unsettling. It was frightening. The noise
was deafening.
I woke up. I was angry because I was enjoying the sleep. You
know that kind of sleep when you have a dream and a fine girl shows
up in the dream and not just a fine girl, but a fine girl you know
in real life, offering you affection and love. Then all of a
sudden, one idiot cuts it off with a shot of reality. I was not
just angry. I was bitter. Only a criminal will wake a man up in the
middle of a romantic dream.
I tried to go back to sleep, to recapture the dream. But dreams
don’t obey commands. They are like moments in a film. They come and
they disappear. And so in this instance, the fine girl didn’t
return. Eventually, I had to wake up, because whoever was
determined to see me, banged on the gate again. I checked the time.
But apparently the barbarians at the gate thought they had some
rights of access and control and ownership.
I asked one of the boys in the compound to go and find out what
was going on at the gate.
I heard sounds. “We are not going anywhere until we see him. If you
people like, you can shoot us. If you like call police. We are
members of the PDP and we will take breakfast in this house this
morning”.
I couldn’t figure out what was going on. I told the gateman to
keep the gate shut. I was told some boys wanted to see me. I gave
somebody some money to go and give them and allow me to sleep. The
money was brought back. I was left with only one option. I went out
to see the intruders. I personally asked them to come in.
“Egbon, this alakowe thing cannot work oh. We have been in front of
your gate since 4 am. We said we wanted to see you, they said you
were sleeping. Sleep how? We are PDP members, anytime we want to
see you, you must wake up.”
The guy that spoke turned out to be the spokesman of the team of
three that entered the compound. I took a look at them. One of them
had a bag slung across his shoulders. He looked menacing. The other
one looked like he was drunk. Their spokesman sounded as if he was
struggling with a hang-over. I later learnt that when they arrived
in front of the gate, their car had crashed into the gutter. They
were so drunk, one of them even slept inside the gutter. Every
effort by the security guards to get them to move away failed. They
woke up around 4 am. They looked up and saw the posters in front of
the gate and they thought it was time for breakfast at my
expense!
I tried to be polite. I asked the boys to bring chairs. The
intruders and I sat in the compound.
They introduced themselves. They turned out to be children of
families that used to be very important in the town. They could
boast of pedigree. Why do the children of important families end up
as vagrants? One of them even said he was a student at Olabisi
Onabanjo University. He didn’t go as far as claiming that he
graduated from the University, but what the heck, he could actually
be a graduate. The spokesman told me he was actually speaking on
behalf of youths in the Estate, and that the three of them had
decided to meet me. I asked if I could offer them anything.
“I have water, gentlemen. Would you like to take water?”
“No. we don’t do that”, the spokesman replied.
“Tea?”
“We don’t do that”, he replied. I thought he sounded irritated.
“Coffee, then”
“That is not our stuff”, he responded.
“Okay, I have beer. Heineken. Chilled. Criminally cold.”
“No, we don’t do that”, came the response.
“There is soft drink in the fridge. Coke, Sprite, Maltina.
Malta”.
“We don’t do that”
“I have Schnapps. Something to warm the stomach. Waa-ale, go and
bring schnapps”
“No. Dr. We don’t want Schnapps”
“Lord’s Dry Gin, then. I have that. Cartons of it.”
“We don’t do that.”
It was 7 am at that point. My uninvited guests were busy rejecting
everything that I offered. I didn’t know what to offer anymore.
Every other person in the compound appeared anxious. I told them to
relax. I knew the families of at least two of the guests. If life
had been fair, they would never have found themselves stalking
anybody as early as 4 am.
“Okay, guys, what do you do? What can I offer you?
“We do Hennessy, XO”
“I don’t have that”
“Then give us Johnnie Walker”
I checked my phone. It was 7. 15 am
“Sorry, I don’t have that in this house.”
What followed was a long lecture by the spokesperson of the
team.
“Egbon, see. We know you very well. We have been watching you.
We have been in front of your house since 4 am. Just forget this
thing about being a technocrat, or an intellectual. You can’t be in
politics and you say you are a technocrat, an intellectual. E
gbagbe e. You have to step down. We decided to come here today to
advise you. Forget grammar, Egbon. Step down.”
I got another 30 minutes of unsolicited advice. I listened. I was
stunned. The boys spoke impeccable English.
“This place is an Estate.”, I told them. “I have been here for
15 years. Do you people live here? Where are you from?”
“Egbon, e fi yen sile. We don’t live here. But our parents have
houses here and we always come here to play football in front of
your house. Have we ever disturbed you? No. We just watch you
whenever you come to Abeokuta. Have we ever entered your house? No.
But if you want to be Deputy Governor, you must reckon with us. We
will enter your house whenever we like.”
“No. You can’t. This is a home, not a party secretariat”
“Egbon, e wo, e gboju nbe… We are PDP members. Even Buruji
Kashamu does not stop us from entering his house. Buruji. Buruji.
Ibu Owo Baba Sherifatu, Ekun oko Susan. You see these your security
men, they can’t stop us. They know us. In this town, ko si omo
anybody.”
I advised them that if they wanted anything, they should go to the
party secretariat. I even gave them the name of the party’s youth
co-ordinator and promised that our team is willing to work with
them. They rejected the offer. They said anytime they need to
interface with me, they would come straight to the house. At 4 am?
They even wanted me to recruit them as my personal team. I told
them I have no plans to create any team. I am in politics to serve
not to create any team of persons who ask for Hennessy and XO at 7
am.
Our conversation soon ran into a cul-de-sac. They asked for my
number. I asked them to take my Personal Assistant’s number. They
insisted they wanted only my own number. I gave them. Then they
asked for money for the boys. I tried to apologize that I had spent
some days on the campaign trail and I had incurred expenses. I
would give them something for breakfast, but they should try and
understand… I could well have been talking to the deaf.
I went in, put some money together, and sent to them. They asked
the PA to return and tell me they needed more money or else, they
would not leave. “How can a whole Deputy Governor give us small
money?” Apparently, in their heads, the 2019 election has been won
and lost. I hid inside the house because I had no additional money
to give them. They eventually left, but that was not the last I
would hear of them.
The same day, sometime in the evening, I was told that some
Okada riders also came to the house. Motorcycles are not allowed
inside the Estate where I live, but somehow they found their way to
the house. The PA who reported the incident to me said he had to
prevent them from seeing me. He didn’t want me to be upset, so he
gave them some money and dismissed them. What did they want? They
wanted me “to do Christmas” for them. I was also told that a woman
also came in the course of the day to ask for help. The PA also
gave her some money. He added that the woman broke down in tears,
and that more people were coming to the house to ask for money. I
was alarmed! Which money?
I am in this thing called politics to make a contribution at
another level and to put practical effect to the ideas we mouth on
a daily basis in the media. There are too many unqualified persons
occupying important positions in Nigerian politics. The educated
elite should seize the initiative and begin to take charge, in the
same manner in which that class took charge between the 40s and
70s. For some reason, however, the Nigerian educated elite lost the
initiative, and allowed a generation of unprepared persons to lead
the country. We need to change that. It may be tough. It may be
risky. But if this country must make progress, we will need to
recruit into the governance arena, more members of the educated and
intelligent class.
When the pressure became excessive- people queuing up in front
of the house to beg for money and food, I began to feel as if I was
losing my mind. I called Ijeoma Nwogwugwu, my MD at Arise TV and
reported my frustration. She didn’t have any magic solution to my
ordeal, but talking to her helped a bit to reduce the load on my
mind. The following day, to tell the truth, I packed my bags and
ran back to Lagos. I rejected every phone call. I needed to regain
my sanity.
But I returned. You can’t run away from the people who will vote
for you. Besides, my Principal had called to complain that our
posters were not on the streets of Abeokuta, and he wanted me to
address that. My brothers waded in immediately and recruited a team
of 60 boys. We had given out thousands of posters, only to find out
that the desperate opposition groups in Ogun State also have their
own boys whose assignment is to remove other candidates’ posters.
The state government even insists that only the candidate favoured
by the State Governor can have his posters in certain places. Other
candidates and parties are not allowed to place their posters in
such places. If you flout the rule, your poster will be removed. I
also learnt that posters can only be pasted at night. Our posters
were removed.
But I decided to take charge. I stopped giving posters to
contractors. My brothers and one of our in-laws, and the team that
we recruited decided to go out the other night to paste posters. We
drew up a movement chart. Start from Aro and walk the town all the
way to Ita Oshin, Lafenwa, Itoku, Sapon and Iyana Mortuary. We had
buckets of starch. You need starch to paste posters. We started at
9 pm and we kept moving from one spot to the other. It was in the
course of this that I discovered how endangered the so-called
Nigerian elite is. Forget government. Forget the elite. Every big
man is living in a fool’s paradise. The people who run Nigeria
belong to the underground. They are laughing at us. The Nigerian
elite will some day pay a big price for failing to raise the level
of the people’s welfare. We are in fact endangering the future of
the children we educate abroad, because this country called Nigeria
has been taken over by those the elite denied the opportunity of
hope and self-fulfillment.
To paste a campaign poster, the party is required to pay some
amount of money to the signage agency, which is not really a
problem, but the real challenge is that you can’t paste any poster
and have it protected except you pay ground rent to an underground
Mafia that is definitely in control of the town. The boys in charge
of this Mafia do not respect government. They are in charge of
territories that they have assigned to themselves. They monitor the
movement of every VIP in the town. They will tell you without
batting an eyelid, that not even the President of Nigeria or the
Governor of the State can do anything to them. They are in charge.
They actually insist that they are the ones in charge. In the
course of this campaign, I have had to send persons to or talk to
persons who claim that they are the real government in Ogun State.
Incidentally, the people know them and respect them. They don’t
even bear normal names and you dare not look down on them.
If I thought they were bluffing, when we got to Ijaiye junction
around 2 am, someone called my phone and told me that he just
sighted me around the area and he wanted to know what I was doing
on the streets of Abeokuta that late. I told him I was at home. He
told me not to lie to him. He quoted my vehicle’s plate number. I
asked him what he too was doing on the streets that late. He
retorted that he was surprised I would ask a street boy what he was
doing on the street at 2 am. What? But the truth is: I have learnt
so much within a month.
I am in Abeokuta for this election. I refuse to be scared. We
are determined to rescue this town and our state from poverty, and
despair, and elevate our people’s standard of living. The campaign
is on from Oju Ogbara, to every junction or base… Yes oh! Eyin omo
Aye, Tuu-ale!