“Being nice merely to be liked in return nullifies the point.” – Criss Jami
Conspiracy theory is widely regarded as the poorest form of political propaganda. But that doesn’t diminish the fact that for every rumour, there is a suppressed truth waiting to surface, same way every smoke points to an underlying fire that betrays the trail. Since Peter Obi’s defection from PDP to Labour Party (LP), with his street credibility frenzy, the party has become the first ipso facto “third force” in Nigeria’s 23-year old democracy. This is not the problem, after all he merely exercised his inalienable rights to freedom of association. The danger is that many bad eggs (especially those who lost out in their parties’ primary elections), and many with brazen integrity challenges suddenly discovered in LP a new haven. And this portends a great danger for Nigeria if per chance (though unlikely) these wolves in sheep clothing cashed into Obi’s popularity to win and get returned elected. I said “unlikely” because Ndi Udenu, nay Ndi Enugu believed that “Ogwụ an’g awo oha” (no hypnotic amulet is potent on the masses).
But the receptacle of the party is currently a cocktail of “agwo na api.” If, as the party claim, it is a place for men of character, then it has to beat a retreat and candle out vipers in its backyard. It was Ernest Bramah who said that “it is a mark of insincerity of purpose to spend one’s time in looking for the sacred Emperor in the low-class tea-shops.”
A case in point is how a certain PDP reject, Hon. Chijioke Edoga and a novitiate in politics, Mr. Obinna Ijere obstinately grabbed stray LP tickets for governorship and State House of Assembly respectively, for the upcoming election.
Edoga, in particular, after justly losing in PDP primary, weighed his tiny options, and was on record to have confided in a reliable source that he would throw his support to a better candidate found in Barr. Peter Mba, whom he believed was the people’s choice. But, he desperately dived the LP ticket which was idle due to unpopularity of the party in the state.
If the news making the round is anything to go by, then Edoga’s candidacy (now nullified by the court) was a mere decoy for an underhanded pay master. He is ostensibly working as a spoiler against the interest of Ndi Enugu to dim the popularity of his fellow Enugu east zone’s compatriot in the race. The same clandestine motive, his co-traveller — Obinna Ijere is exhibiting against Hon. Solomon Onah, who has the endorsement of Udenu people for state assembly seat.
In some corners, many believed that Edoga, coming from Peter Mba’s neighborhood of Isi Uzo, is doing a hatchet job for some frustrated politicians, who were bankrolling him to reduce the bulk votes from Enugu East and North senatorial districts. Of course, such gimmicks has been the stock-in-trade of selfish Enugu ‘stakeholders’ since Gov. Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi’s leadership made transparency its watchword. In whichever way, Hon. Edoga’s inordinate desire to court even the devil just to remain ‘relevant’ is not settling well with Ndi Enugu. And the ever-reliable Nigerian judiciary knew it.
Rejected in daylight, these enemies of the state allegedly co-opted Edoga in the dark to perpetuate a spoiler’s plan against the interest of his own people, when they saw that APC candidate, Uche Nnaji is a paper-weight to the growing fame of Peter Mba in the contest. But unknown to him, both he and his alleged masked sponsors are already rejected by Enugu people.
This injustice was roundly defined in the mid-morning of Wednesday, 09 November, 2022, when Justice Evelyn Maha of the Federal High Court, Abuja nullified the primary election that produced Mr Edeoga as its candidate. The court subsequently ordered the party to conduct a fresh primary election within 14 days.
Now that his election has been invalidated, the world have seen the scam he represented.
Labour party should also know that its widening growth may be on suicide mission, if it doesn’t guard its door against intrusion of men of undefined ambition. Autolysis — a biological condition that best illustrates the inevitability of such political error may soon set in.
They need to watch it or NIgerian electorates will watch it for them.
The evil of double-crossing is characteristic of selfish politicians who have been the nemesis of the good people of Udenu and the state in general. We have grown above their deception. As they say on the street, 2023 “go shock dem.”
Udenu United Fronts (UUF)
