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OPINION: Rivers Of Betrayals

Published

2 years ago

November 28, 2023

By Suyi Ayodele

“A child”, the elders of my place say, “only knows when he takes the oath of loyalty but is never aware when he breaks it” (Ojó tí omodé bá mu ilẹ̀ lo mo; kii mo ojó tọ́ bá da). They did not stop there. They go a bit further to talk about the consequence of treachery. Their judgement is a grave one. They submit thus: “Ilẹ̀ ní pa òdàlẹ̀” (The earth kills the one who breaks an oath). Now listen. When you hear the word, “ilẹ̀”, my elders are not by any means referring to the solid surface known as land – earth surface. No. It is deeper than that. Ilẹ̀ in Yoruba philosophy goes beyond the physical. My little knowledge of our culture tells me that once a person is cursed with the land, all terrestrial and celestial bodies are invoked and evoked to come to play. I know one or two persons that suffered the misfortune of being so cursed. As I penned this, my mind raced to those personalities in pity, and I trembled at the same time.

I tell you a short story of how someone I know suffered the fate that befalls every treacherous being. The two characters in the story are brothers of the same father. Their family, like every other polygamous set up, is not spared the ordeals of sibling rivalry. But those two guys were the closest in their family, or so we thought. They also shared one common character determiner; they are both rogues. So, it happened that one night, they conspired to burgle a tenant’s apartment in their father’s house. As planned, the elder brother was the one who climbed the ceiling to gain access to the apartment. As soon as his younger brother confirmed that he was in the room, he raised the alarm. Neighbours gathered and surrounded the house. It was to everybody’s shock when the thief was caught, and he turned out to be the son of the landlord. The culprit, on sighting his brother, asked why he decided to act the way he did. The police came and took him into custody. Days later, he was arraigned in a magistrate court and was summarily sentenced to a three-year prison term. He did his term and returned home in the dead of the night.

Early the following day, he left for the family’s ancestral home and sent a traditional message to the elders of their clan to join him there because he had a story to tell. The elders gathered. Some wayfarers joined them. Then he went ahead to narrate how his brother betrayed him on the night he was caught. His brother was in the audience. He did not dispute what the elder brother said. Before the elders could speak, the ex-convict did something tragic and irreversible. On the traditional spot where the family’s first placenta was buried, the ex-convict placed his left foot on it and issued a curse on his half-brother thus: “Let the land judge between us if I deserved the treachery from you that night.” The people present chorused “Ase”- Amen. He (the one caught) left town, only to return years later, a practically useless man. The last time I was in their place, I saw the two brothers. The signs of the effects of the jail term and the curse were very visible. Indeed, “Ilẹ̀ nií pa òdàlẹ̀.”

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Mr. Nyesom Wike, the immediate past governor of Rivers State, and current Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), has been in the news in the last couple of days. And it is for very bad reasons, though that has, in itself, become the new normal in the Nigerian political firmament. Wike, unarguably, is a man who thrives in trouble and controversies. He is the typical “Arogunyo” (he who is happy when there is war). Is that an enviable attribute? I leave you to answer that. From doing-in his own political party, the now comatose Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), in the last presidential elections, to his attempt to remove, unceremoniously, his political protégé and successor, Governor Siminalayi Fubara, to practically insulting a Bishop of the Anglican Communion, Rt. Rev. Emmanuel Oko-Jaja, the Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Niger Delta, the FCT minister cuts the picture of a man whose yam turns out to be the biggest in the compound but has not learnt the wisdom of covering his mouth while eating it. There is a word of caution for such indiscreet behaviour. I don’t know how much of learning Wike has in our culture. I can just offer a free lesson here, to wit, what joins one to eat the biggest yam is more than one’s family members.

I saw the video of Wike’s tirade on the Bishop, and I asked myself what would have been the reaction of, let’s say, My Lord Bishop Emmanuel Bolanle Gbonigi, the retired Bishop of Akure Diocese. Tufiakwa! No Jupiter would dare do such a thing where my Lord Bishop Gbonigi presides. Not even a Military Governor or Administrator would ever come to the lion’s lair the way Wike did in Port Harcourt about a week ago, where he openly upbraided the clergyman for not recognising him when he (Wike) entered the church. Such behaviour also has a description in our traditional folksongs. In one of the songs, someone of Wike’s behaviour is called; “Ajaye ma wo ehin” – he who carries on without a thought for the end result. The elders, again, warn such an individual to note that the world rotates. Today, Wike is the FCT Minister. But for how long? Probably, another eight years, if God permits. After that, he becomes an ex-FCT Minister the same way he is being referred to as ex-governor! That is life. It moves, it revolves and those who carry on without sparing a thought for the repercussion of their actions and inactions are usually caught on the wrong side of history.

How true then is the saying that a man with bad character may not necessarily know himself? I found an answer to this question in the recent statement credited to Minister Wike, who was quoted to have said that he could not tolerate ingrates. Whao! So, the restless former governor detests ingratitude? Wike, while speaking at a function in Abuja, described his successor, Governor Fubara, as an ingrate, who attempted to crumble his political structure in Rivers State.

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This is how the minister described his successor and the political crisis in the once-peaceful state: “Let me tell you, I don’t like ingrates. I can’t stand it. What is happening now is what former Governor Peter Odili said in his book: ‘Give a man, power and money, then you will know the person.’ If you haven’t given a man, power, and money then you don’t know the person…. You know what is painful? All these allegations, I smile. Who and who sat with him. In all your doings be grateful in your life no matter the circumstance. Nobody who is a gentleman, and a politician will support this kind of thing. I left projects for him to commission so he would showcase them during his 100 days, then politics came in. We are just starting. God gave you something, you are now importing crisis. God gave this on a platter of gold, no crisis. The Federal Government is not fighting you; nobody at home is fighting you. You are the one trying to create a crisis for yourself. What kind of system is that? Who does that? Only ingrates that it is in their blood that will support what is happening there. Only those who are naturally ingrates.”

So, in all his dealings with all the benevolent political squirrels that cracked his political palm kernels for him, Wike has remained grateful to all of them? Who among his political benefactors has Wike not shown ingratitude to? Who among them has he not decimated? Which of the political structure that was used in making Wike chairman of a council, Chief of Staff to Governor Rotimi Amaechi, Minister of State for Education and finally governor of Rivers State, is still standing today. Has Wike been eternally grateful to his benefactors, like Dr Peter Odili, whose book, “Conscience and History – My Story”, he quoted at the Abuja function. If Odili had not shown magnanimity, maturity, and a deep sense of forgiveness, would he and Wike have been on talking terms today? What about Rotimi Amaechi, the man who handed over power to Wike? Is the Ikwere man not nursing the fatal political injury inflicted on him by Wike till date? If Amaechi were to write the memoirs of his political voyage, how many negative chapters would Wike occupy? What has been the foundation of Rivers State since the beginning of this present democratic dispensation if not treachery, ingratitude, and acute backstabbing?

While one will not necessarily support Fubara burning the bridge that he used in crossing his political river, it is completely out of place for Wike to talk about ingratitude. His entire political life and journey is built on that infamy. Whatever a man sows, is what he reaps. Nothing changes that! Is Wike not ungrateful to the PDP which sharpened his political teeth for him? Did he not sink the PDP in Rivers, Enugu, Abia, Oyo, and Benue States, when he led the PDP G-5 Governors, in the last election? Without the PDP, would Wike have amounted to anything politically? Is he not an ingrate and a prodigal political son to the benevolent Odili? Did he not repay Amaechi, the man who made him a CoS, a junior minister, and a governor with ingratitude when he found new masters in the former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan and his wife, Madam Patience Goodluck Jonathan? But for selling his old godfather, Amaechi for 30 Shekels of silver like Judas Iscariot, would Wike not have been long confined to the ignoble dustbin of political history? Something is wrong with Rivers State. The owners of the land need to look deeper into the issue of political treachery in the oil-rich state. The way political leaders there change loyalty like a baby’s diapers calls for concern. Political decency appears to be in short supply over there!

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In Rivers State, it has been an unbroken stream of treachery. Odili tells it all in his “Conscience and History – My Story.” The Rivers’ political ancestor tells the story of how he made his own Personal Assistant, Rotimi Amaechi, a member of the House of Assembly, and then the speaker. Wike was a council chairman in the Odili government. When it was discovered that the Abuja powerhouse would not support Amaechi’s governorship PDP candidature, it was the same Amaechi who nominated his cousin, Celestine Omehia and he was elected governor. Suddenly, the same Amaechi became incommunicado and disappeared from the radar of the godfather, Odili. By the time Amaechi resurfaced, Omehia was no longer the governor, having been removed by his cousin, Amaechi. As the new governor, Amaechi appointed Wike his CoS, and the duo ganged up to dethrone Odili as the political godfather of Rivers and stripped him naked! Then it was the turn of Wike to derobe and dethrone Amaechi, who made him CoS, nominated him to Goodluck Jonathan for appointment as minister.

Amaechi lost Wike to Abuja and from there joined forces with Amaechi’s foes to sack him from Rivers politics. With Abuja behind him, Wike defeated Amaechi’s candidate and became governor of Rivers. In the last election, Mr. Wike made his Accountant General, Fubara, the governor. Seven months down the line, Fubara is up in arms against Wike as a continuation of that narration of treachery. One strange thing about it all is that at every bus stop of treachery, each of the traitors complained loudly that he had been betrayed. The Yoruba say curse (egun) moves from one generation to the other. Treachery will continue in that political family in Rivers for a long time until an outsider comes in to break the jinx. Did Odili ever do that to whoever his political godfathers were? That is a task for political historians to handle.

It is true that Wike has been much luckier than his mates. He has enjoyed the best of political patronage and upliftment. He has the right to behave like the proverbial “Ajaye ma wo ehin.” Most people in his category see others who are less-fortunate as never-do-well. But there is always a tomorrow for people in that mould. When you eat in the house of a benevolent deity, it is foolish to look at others in a home that suffers lack with disdain. Why? There is a saying by my people that “Ebora ayini je, he yini hi ta”- the deity that feeds you doesn’t give you to sell. This means there is an extent to which luck can carry a man. Wike had used the sword of treachery to decapitate his political benefactors in the past. It is natural that Wike is worried that Fubara is sharpening that same sword and aiming at his political skull. He can fight all the fights. He has the support of those in power. But one thing is sure; vengeance will surely come at the appointed time. The sword has been unsheathed. It is now like the Biblical “bow of Jonathan”, and the “sword of Saul”, which “turned not back, and returned not empty” without touching “the blood of the slain”, and “the fat of the mighty” (2 Samuel 1:22). He can only postpone the evil days; they will surely come the way day succeeds the night. This is not a curse; it is the course of life that no man can change. We will witness it and we will recall that at a point in time, the past treachery of a mighty man was fully repaid in full measure, if not more. It will happen!

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Out-of-school: Group To Enroll Adolescent Mothers In Bauchi

Published

2 days ago

December 10, 2025

Editor

Women Child Youth Health and Education Initiative (WCY) with support from Malala Education Champion Network, have charted a way to enroll adolescent mothers to access education in Bauchi schools.

Rashida Mukaddas, the Executive Director, WCY stated this in Bauchi on Wednesday during a one-day planning and inception meeting with education stakeholders on Adolescent Mothers Education Access (AMEA) project of the organisation.

According to her, the project targeted three Local Government Areas of Bauchi, Misau and Katagum for implementation in the three years project.

She explained that all stakeholders in advancing education in the state would be engaged by the organisation to advocate for Girl-Child education.

The target, she added, was to ensure that as many as married adolescent mothers and girls were enrolled back in school in the state.

“Today marks an important step in our collective commitment to ensuring that every girl in Bauchi state, especially adolescent who are married, pregnant, or young mothers has the right, opportunity, and support to continue and complete her education.

“This project has been designed to address the real and persistent barriers that prevent too many adolescent mothers from returning to school or staying enrolled.

“It is to address the barriers preventing adolescent mothers from continuing and completing their education and adopting strategies that will create an enabling environment that safeguard girls’ rights to education while removing socio-cultural and economic obstacles,” said Mukaddas.

She further explained to the stakeholders that the success of the project depended on the strength of their collaboration, the alignment of their actions, and the commitments they forge toward the implementation of the project.

Also speaking, Mr Kamal Bello, the Project Officer of WCY, said that the collaboration of all the education stakeholders in the state with the organisation could ensure stronger enforcement of the Child Rights Law.

This, he said, could further ensure effective re-entry and retention policies for adolescent girls, increased community support for girls’ education and a Bauchi state where no girl was left behind because of marriage, pregnancy, or motherhood.

“It is observed that early marriage is one of the problems hindering girls’ access to education.

“This organisation is working toward ensuring that girls that have dropped out of school due to early marriage are re-enrolled back in school,” he said.

Education stakeholders present at the event included representatives from the state Ministry of Education, Justice, Budget and Economic Planning and Multilateral Coordination.

Others were representatives from International Federation of Women Lawyers, Adolescent Girls Initiative for Learning and Empowerment (AGILE), Bauchi state Agency for Mass Education, Civil Society Organization, Religious and Traditional institutions, among others.

They all welcomed and promised to support the project so as to ensure its effective implementation and achieve its set objectives in the state.

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OPINION: Fubara, Adeleke And The Survival Dance

Published

2 days ago

December 10, 2025

Editor

By Israel Adebiyi

You should be aware by now that the dancing governor, Ademola Adeleke has danced his last dance in the colours of the Peoples Democratic Party. His counterpart in Rivers, Siminalayi Fubara has elected to follow some of his persecutors to the All Progressive Congress, after all “if you can’t beat them, you can join them.”
Politics in Nigeria has always been dramatic, but every now and then a pattern emerges that forces us to pause and think again about where our democracy is heading. This week on The Nation’s Pulse, that pattern is what I call the politics of survival. Two events in two different states have brought this into sharp focus. In both cases, sitting governors elected on the platform of the same party have found new homes elsewhere. Their decisions may look sudden, but they reveal deeper issues that have been growing under the surface for years.

In Rivers, Governor Siminalayi Fubara has crossed into the All Progressives Congress. In Osun, Governor Ademola Adeleke has moved to the Accord Party. These are not small shifts. These are moves by people at the top of their political careers, people who ordinarily should be the ones holding their parties together. When those at the highest levels start fleeing, it means the ground beneath them has become too shaky to stand on. It means something has broken.

A Yoruba proverb captures it perfectly: Iku to n pa oju gba eni, owe lo n pa fun ni. The death that visits your neighbour is sending you a message. The crisis that has engulfed the Peoples Democratic Party did not start today. It has been building like an untreated infection. Adeleke saw the signs early. He watched senior figures fight openly. He watched the party fail to resolve its zoning battles. He watched leaders undermine their own candidates. At some point, you begin to ask yourself a simple question: if this house collapses today, what happens to me? In Osun, where the competition between the two major parties has always been fierce, Adeleke was not going to sit back and become another casualty of a party that refused to heal itself. Survival became the most reasonable option.

His case makes sense when you consider the political temperature in Osun. This is a state where the opposition does not sleep. Every misstep is amplified. Every weakness is exploited. Adeleke has spent his time in office under constant scrutiny. Add that to the fact that the national structure of his party is wobbly, divided and uncertain about its future, and the move begins to look less like betrayal and more like self-preservation.

Rivers, however, tells a slightly different story. Fubara’s journey has been a long lesson in endurance. From the moment he emerged as governor, it became clear he was stepping into an environment loaded with expectations that had nothing to do with governance. His political godfather was not content with being a supporter. He wanted control. He wanted influence. He wanted obedience. Every decision was interpreted through the lens of loyalty. From the assembly crisis to the endless reconciliation meetings, to the barely hidden power struggles, Fubara spent more time fighting shadows than building the state he was elected to lead.

It soon became clear that he was governing through a maze of minefields. Those who should have been allies began to treat him like an accidental visitor in the Government House. The same legislators who were meant to be partners in governance suddenly became instruments of pressure. Orders came from places outside the official structure. Courtrooms turned into battlegrounds. At some point, even the national leadership of his party seemed unsure how to tame the situation. These storms did not come in seasons, they came in waves. One misunderstanding today. Another in two weeks. Another by the end of the month. Anyone watching closely could see that the governor was in a permanent state of emergency.

So when the winds started shifting again and lawmakers began to realign, those who understood the undercurrents knew exactly what was coming. Fubara knew too. A man can only take so much. After months of attacks, humiliations and attempts to cage his authority, the move to another party was not just political. It was personal. He had given the reconciliation process more chances than most would. He had swallowed more insults than any governor should. He had watched institutions bend and twist under the weight of private interests. In many ways, his defection is a declaration that he has finally chosen to protect himself.

But the bigger question is how we got here. How did two governors in two different parts of the country end up taking the same decision for different but related reasons? The answer goes back to the state of internal democracy in our parties. No party in Nigeria today fully practices the constitution it claims to follow. They have elaborate rules on paper but very loose habits in reality. They talk about fairness, but their primaries are often messy. They preach unity, but their caucuses are usually divided into rival camps. They call themselves democratic institutions, yet dissent is treated as disloyalty.

Political parties are supposed to be the engine rooms of democracy. They are the homes where ideas are debated, leaders are groomed, and future candidates are shaped. In Nigeria, they increasingly look like fighting arenas where the loudest voices drown out everyone else. When leaders ignore their own constitutions, the structure begins to crack. When factions begin to run parallel meetings, the foundation gets weaker. When decisions are forced down the throats of members, people begin making private plans for their future.

No governor wants to govern in chaos. No politician wants to be the last one standing in a sinking ship. This is why defections are becoming more common. A party that cannot manage itself cannot manage its members. And members who feel exposed will always look for safer ground.

But while these moves make sense for Adeleke and Fubara personally, the people they govern often become the ones left in confusion. Voters choose candidates partly because of party ideology, even if our ideologies are weak. They expect stability. They expect continuity. They expect that the mandate they gave will remain intact. So when a governor shifts political camp without prior consultation, the people feel blindsided. They begin to wonder whether their votes carry weight in a system where elected officials can switch platforms in the blink of an eye.

This is where the politics of survival becomes dangerous for democracy. If leaders keep prioritizing their personal safety over party stability, the system begins to lose coherence. Parties lose their identity. Elections lose their meaning. Governance becomes a game of musical chairs. Today you are here. Tomorrow you are there. Next week you may be somewhere else. The people become bystanders in a democracy that is supposed to revolve around them.

Rivers and Osun should serve as reminders that political parties need urgent restructuring. They need to rebuild trust internally. They need to enforce their constitutions consistently. They need to treat members as stakeholders, not spectators. When members feel protected, they stay. When they feel targeted, they run. This pattern will continue until parties learn the simple truth that power is not built by intimidation, but by inclusion.

There is also the question of what these defections mean for governance. When governors are dragged into endless party drama, service delivery suffers. Time that should be spent on roads, schools, hospitals, water projects and job creation ends up being spent in meetings, reconciliations and press briefings. Resources that should strengthen the state end up funding political battles. The public loses twice. First as witnesses to the drama. Then as victims of delayed or abandoned development.

In Rivers, the months of tension slowed down the government. Initiatives were stalled because the governor was busy trying to survive political ambush. In Osun, Adeleke had to juggle governance with internal fights in a crumbling party structure. Imagine what they could have achieved if they were not constantly looking over their shoulders.

Now, as both men settle into new political homes, the final question is whether these new homes will provide stability or merely temporary shelter. Nigeria’s politics teaches one consistent lesson. New alliances often come with new expectations. New platforms often come with new demands. And new godfathers often come with new conditions. Whether Adeleke and Fubara have truly found peace or simply bought time is something only time will tell.

But as citizens, what we must insist on is simple. The politics of survival should not become the politics of abandonment. Our leaders can fight for their political life, but they must not forget that they hold the people’s mandate. The hunger, poverty, insecurity and infrastructural decay that Nigerians face will not be solved by defection. It will be solved by steady leadership and functional governance.

The bigger lesson from Rivers and Osun is clear. If political parties in Nigeria continue on this path of disunity and internal sabotage, they will keep losing their brightest and most strategic figures. And if leaders keep running instead of reforming the system, then we will wake up one day to a democracy where the people are treated as an afterthought.

Governors may survive the storms. Parties may adjust to new alignments. But the people cannot keep paying the price. Nigeria deserves a democracy that works for the many, not the few. That is the real pulse of the nation.

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Human Rights Day: Stakeholders Call For More Campaigns Against GBV

Published

2 days ago

December 10, 2025

Editor

Panel of discussants at an event to commemorate the International Human Rights Day, 2025 on Wednesday called for more campaigns against Gender-Based Violence, adding that it must start from the family.

The panel of discussants drawn from religious and community leaders, security agents, members of the civil society community, chiefs, etc, made the call in Benin in an event organised by Justice Development & Peace Centre (JDPC), Benin, in collaboration with Women Aid Collective (WACOL) with the theme: Multilevel Dialogue for Men, Women, Youth and Critical Take holders on the Prevention and Response to Gender-Based Violence (GBV).

The stakeholders, who said causes of GBV are enormous, called for more enlightenment and education in the family, community and the religious circle.

Security agents in the panel charged members of the public to report GBV cases to security agents regardless of the sex Involved, adding: “When GBV happens, it should be reported to the appropriate quarters. It doesn’t matter if the woman or the man is the victim. GBV perpetrators should not be covered up, they must be exposed. We are there to carry out the prosecution after carrying out the necessary investigation.”

Earlier in his opening remarks, Executive Director, JDPC, Rev. Fr. Benedicta Onwugbenu, lamented that (GBV) remains the most prevalent in the society yet hidden because of silence from victims.

According to him, GBV knows no age, gender or race, adding that “It affects people of all ages, whether man or woman, boy or girl.”

“It affects people from different backgrounds and communities, yet it remains hidden because of silence, stigma, and fear. Victims of GBV are suffering in silence.”

On her part, Programme Director, WACOL, Mrs. Francisca Nweke, who said “women are more affected, and that is why we are emphasising on them,” stressed “we are empowering Christian women and women leaders of culture for prevention and response to Gender-Based Violence in Nigeria through the strengthening of grassroots organisations.”