By Tunde Odesola

I’ll beat about the bush because a hunter beats about the bush for reasons, which include awakening the bush, calling attention to his presence, or coordinating an attack. By name, I’m a hunter; by profession, I’m a newshound – two synonyms for go-getter.

If you’re a wine connoisseur, do you mind coming with me to my vineyard to beat about the bush together? However, if you’re a teetotaller, you can stay in the shade of the vines and watch as we, connoisseurs, put our taste buds to use.

Taste is the difference between the teetotaller and the wine connoisseur. Since the days of yore when Ogun, the god of war and iron, stopped by in Ire-Ekiti for palm wine, brewing was a respected occupation, and taste was a must-have among the five human senses, which comprise vision, auditory, smell and touch.

In the beginning of time, ‘lati igba iwase, ti alaye ti d’aye’, when human progenitors first occupied the earth, there existed natural alcoholic drinks, which consisted of palm wine variants, before sekete, burukutu, ogogoro, otika, and their faraway colleagues such as whiskey, brandy, rum, vodka, cognac, etc., joined the party

For the connoisseur, taste is everything, and mood is adaptive. The million bubbles in a frothing beer can soothe the crankiness of a sunny day, just as the punch in vodka can provide fire for the intestines on a cold day.

Using the connoisseur-teetotaller illustration, this article intends to show the ‘beauty in divergence’ by bringing out the outcomes of a football match between Barcelona and Real Madrid in Spain to comment on Nigerian and Spanish politics. Similarly, the article’s liquor-spirit imagery is a metaphor, which sees spirit(s) as a force that seizes football players at the peak of performance and as the liquor drunk by Oyinbo but which intoxicates Kuku. Spirit(s) is the turbulent genie in a bottle.

Going by the South-West’s unmatched series of developmental initiatives among the three regional governments of the federation after independence, Nigeria’s feet would have been planted on the path of greatness if the late sage, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, had taken the reins of power in the Second Republic between 1979 and 1983. Corruption stopped Awo.

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While Spain got television in 1956, Awolowo, it was, who established the first television station in Africa, Western Nigeria Television, Ibadan, in 1959. His leadership went on to record many historic firsts in the annals of the country.

What do Spain and Nigeria have to do with October 1? Please, read on.

Although Spain and Nigeria are independent countries, some regions of both nations are embroiled in the struggle for self-determination. The Catalan provinces of Spain – Barcelona, Girona, Lleida and Tarragona, have ceaselessly engaged the Spanish authorities in agitations for self-independence, just like some regions of Nigeria, such as South-East, South-West and South-South.

In 1932, Catalonia was an autonomous community within Spain, having a high degree of self-government, with its own parliament, police, and official language – Catalan. But between 1939 and 1975, the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, upholding nationalist ideology, disrobed Catalonia of dignity and identity because the region was predisposed to republican ideology. Consequently, Franco abolished Catalan autonomy in 1938 to strengthen his grip on power during the Spanish Civil War.

According to FC Barcelona website, in 1936, the President of Barcelona FC, Josep Suñol, was arrested along with some of his colleagues when their car inadvertently “entered a zone controlled by Franco’s troops in Sierra de Guadarrama. Suñol was identified and arrested, and without trial, he and his colleagues were shot dead on the spot”.

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Supported by Benito Mussolini’s Italy and Nazi Germany, Franco tightened his grip on power, using all apparatuses of coercion, including football.

Not a football lover in the real sense of it, but in an attempt to leverage the popularity of football for his fascism, Franco opened Spain’s vault to FC Real Madrid even as his army intimidated rival teams into losing matches to Real Madrid.

It was in the heat of Franco’s intolerance and the resistance of the Catalonia community that El Clásico was forged as the fiercest football rivalry ever.

General Franco laid the foundation for the sense of entitlement and cry-baby mentality displayed by Real Madrid when results do not go their way. The unsportsmanlike behaviour displayed by Real Madrid players, such as Antonio Rudiger, Vinícius Júnior, Jude Bellingham and Lucas Vázquez during their 3-2 Copa del Rey final loss to Barcelona on April 26, 2025, exposes a team whose claim to trophies has been partly aided by referees and La Liga favouritism.

A campaign to intimidate referees saw Real Madrid, midway into the 2024-2025 season, weeping like a kid resisting a bath, accusing La Liga referees of colluding to rob the club of points, but Coach Carlo Ancelotti was silent when bad officiating was made against Real Sociadad in Copa del Rey semi-final, enabling his team to go through to the final to meet their waterloo, Barcelona.

Before the 3-2 Copa loss to Barcelona, Real Madrid, with an ego larger than a football pitch, had threatened not to honour the final match, calling for a change of match officials, a request turned down by La Liga.

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This psychological assault led the centre referee in the Copa del Rey final, Ricardo de Burgos Bengoetxea, to weep during a press conference, saying his son was told in school that his father was a thief. Bogged down by the psychological trauma inflicted on him by Real Madrid, Bengoetxea wasn’t courageous enough to award, at least, two obvious penalties to Barcelona.

There’s a lesson Nigerian separatist groups can learn from the Catalonia community. The Catalonian province of Barcelona has a symbol in Barcelona FC, and it has weaponised the symbol as an agent of socio-cultural and political change.

The Catalonian province of Barcelona knows that the separatist struggle is not a tea party. Therefore, it laid a solid foundation for the breeding of talents through its youth academy, La Masia, which, in 2010, became the first football academy to churn out all three finalists for the Ballon d’Or in a single year.

Conviction, consistency and courage are virtues Catalonian autonomy agitators have in large supply, unlike most Nigerian self-determination groups, whose struggles are fuelled by corruption.

On October 1, 1960, Nigeria attained independence. On October 1, 2017, the Catalonian community declared self-autonomy. Nigeria has continued to grope in the dark for almost 65 years. Catalonia had its declaration crushed, but it has remained an economic nerve to Spain.

Beaten to Super Copa and Copa del Rey trophies by Barcelona, and already bundled out of the Champions League, the shenanigans of Real Madrid have failed to deliver real results this season.

Despite the 3-3 draw in the first leg of the UCL semifinal at Barcelona, Inter Milan coach, Simon Inzaghi, knows that the fear of Hansi Flick is the beginning of wisdom. Inzaghi knows Paris will fall. Ancelotti failed to realise a new lord has taken over the manor, thinking abracadabra would save him and Real Madrid. Carlo is now on the way to Brazil. So sad.

Forca Barca!