The award-winning international literary lioness, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie stirred the hornet’s nest recently when she published an open letter to the US President, Joe Biden, in ‘The Atlantic’ magazine. In the strongly-worded epistle the renowned author of ‘Half Of A Yellow Sun’ disagreed sharply with the congratulatory message extended to the controversial ‘President-elect’ of Nigeria, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Ms Adichie queried the US democratic wisdom in congratulating Tinubu when his victory was not only tainted but still hangs on the balance judicially. She added the British Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, to the letter by interrogating the reason behind their felicitation when knotty issues surrounding the election are yet to be sorted out in court.
Ever since that open missive was published and circulated online the Tinubu attack dogs had risen in defense of their principal, each giving their own interpretation and version of condemnation. The reactions that trailed her provocative submissions are expected since she told truth to power without minding the consequences.
Ngozi Adichie had openly supported Peter Obi of the Labour Party before the presidential poll took place last February. Like the rest of us it was a wise choice! She had described Obi as a man of virtue whom she would not wait any longer to call ‘Mr President’!
And now that Obi had won the election but was rigged out she was mad with rage. Her frustration is located in the very fact that Uncle Sam, a great democracy of global standing, seemingly closed her eyes to the sophisticated manipulation of the presidential poll in favour of the announced ‘winner’.
Like the Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, Chimamanda Adichie’s voice of reason is respected around the world. She is brilliant, intrepid and sure-footed intellectually. She is a proud patriotic Nigerian even though she lives and works in America.
In the harsh open letter entitled: “Nigeria’s Hollow Democracy” she pulled punches describing the electoral process that produced Asiwaju as President-elect as fraudulent.
Now the Asiwaju army of defenders had all risen in sharp counter attack. First to fire the salvo was the controversial Chief Spokesperson for the All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council, Bayo Onanuga, who described the piece as a “fiction” urging the POTUS “to trash the letter once it gets to his desk”.
Femi Fani-Kayode dded his voice to the matter by describing it as “an epistle of garbage”! FFK remains infinitely an intellectual lilliputian whose emotions often clash with reason. Sister Chimamanda must have had a great laugh upon stumbling on the ramblings on Twitter by the rehabilitated drug addict and wife -beater.
For Minister Festus Keyamo, another glorified Tinubu attack dog, Ms Adichie was “a pathetic supporter of sore loser in the election”. He described the letter itself as “worthless”!
Dele Alake, Special Adviser on Communications to the ‘President-elect’ sought to outdo the others by penning a lengthy rebuttal in which he insisted that democracy in Nigeria was thriving, contrary to Chimamanda’s claims.
Foolishly describing the celebrated author as “an unrepentant Igbo jingoist” Alake declared that the “point is that she is Igbo like Peter Obi and wanted him to win for purely primordial reasons” pointing out the ‘Igbocentric’ perception of reality contained in the award-winning book on the Biafran pogrom, Half of a Yellow Sun.
Before they ‘crucify’ sister Chimamanda (my God will never fail) Ngozi (blessing) Adichie (the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus the Christ in mind!) we must rise boldly in her defense. What she said in her open letter to President Biden is not strange in any stretch of imagination.
Her position is shared by the majority of Nigerians who voted massively for a particular candidate of change but whose mandate had been stolen! The Asiwaju mob cannot wish away the fact that the Prof. Mahmood Yakubu-led INEC was criminally compromised leading to the controversial electoral verdict they delivered.
If opposing that electoral heist constitutes a crime then we are all guilty! Sister Chimamanda is neither a hypocrite nor a yes-woman!
In Nigeria there is this urgent need for more electoral reform especially as it concerns litigations following disputed polls. It is inconceivable that a man whose election is subject to judicial challenge would be sworn into the office for which there are grounds for serious disagreement.
In Kenya presidential elections had been upturned and re-run ordered. But the Nigerian judiciary does not possess the authoritative independent judicial fire and power like their Kenyan counterparts.
And herein lies the problem, the crux of the matter!
SOC Okenwa
soco_abj_2006_rci@hotmail.fr
