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Our Dear Dr. Yakubu Gowon (GCFR)

By

Kòmbò Mason Braide (PhD)

Port Harcourt, .

Of Soldiers, Gentlemen & Prayerful Elder Statesmen:

We will not refer to you as "Sir", as has unfortunately been the norm of master-servant interaction in Nigeria, since Saturday, 15 January 1966, when the syntax, semantics, and semiotics of barrack level reality began to infiltrate, and then overwhelm the collective psyche of Nigerians. Neither will we bore you with sycophantic references to your military rank as a four-star general. This does not mean that we do not respect you, or hold you in high regard. On the contrary, we do. Therefore, there is no cause for alarm yet, please.

Furthermore, let us assure you that this is not another useless diatribe about the Bakassi Peninsular, now safely and legally repositioned in La République du Cameroun. It is about premeditated terrorism.

Nigerians are very lucky to have you still alive today. We thank God. Unlike quite a lot of your less fortunate peers, and subordinates, during your hectic career as a soldier in the , you are alive, well, and actively, though unobtrusively, involved in the affairs of our motherland, Nigeria.

It simply cannot be for nothing that fate forced you to free yourself from the imposed handicaps of limited education and ignorance, to acquire quality education, and proper grooming, more or less from scratch, up to postgraduate level, from a good university, quite unlike most of your seniors, peers, and juniors, or even the majority of the unfortunate students in Nigerian universities today. In short, we believe very strongly that God Almighty is a Nigerian. If not, then definitely, Nigerians must be God’s own special, even if prodigal, children.

We are seizing the opportunity provided by this open forum to refresh your mind candidly, about some salient issues of national urgency in Nigeria today. We will assume that your worldview now is, by far, better refined than those of most of your former professional colleagues, and contemporaries in the Nigerian military, mainly by virtue of the enlightenment that you acquired, while you were forced into self-exile in the UK by a military cabal, then led by the incumbent civilian President of Nigeria, 1975 Brigadier Olusegun Obasanjo, sarcastically nicknamed "Omo Oba", in those good old days of the jolly good old Nigerian Army, but now sycophantically referred to as "Uncle Şégě ", "OBJ", and "Bàbã Ìyábò", by various species of bloody civilian political parasites, vermin, and vampires that perpetually loiter around the corridors of Aso Rock Villa, Abuja.

As you are fully aware, President Olusegun Obasanjo was a very close friend of late Major Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu, one of the forerunners of Nigeria’s culture of coups d’état, that ultimately brought our beloved country to its current sorry

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state. Some Nigerians still argue that, where it not for the events of that fateful day, on Saturday, 15 January 1966, most probably, Nigerians would never have known of you, or OBJ, or any one of the several predatory military autocrats that imposed their egos on the collective consciousness of Nigerians, over the past 36 years.

Maybe, Nigeria would have been reduced to debris by now, through the chaos that would have been fomented by the indiscretions of some dogma-fixated twats, in and out of the Nigerian Armed Forces, with their inexplicable craving to dip their sacred literature into the Bights of Benin and Biafra, in today’ oil-endowed Gulf of Guinea, in the mid-Atlantic Ocean, as if by divine injunction. Who knows? We may never know.

At any rate, Olusegun Obasanjo was also a one time GOC under your command, and a one-time Commissioner of Works under you, exactly like ex-policeman Sir (Chief) Tony Anenih (JP), was the Minister of Works and Housing, under OBJ, until very recently.

Today, Nigeria is lucky to still have other living fellow old soldiers of the same Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigerian, which you led, like: Major General (Chief) Robert Adeyinka Adebayo, Major General (Chief) David Ejoor, and Major General Mohammed Shuwa, Brigadiers Rotimi, Mobolaji Johnson, Benjamin Adekunle, and , and a few others, quietly watching what is happening to Nigeria, a country you all tried your human best to salvage, and rebuild, but painfully, now under the lamentable direct imperial supervision of one of your former subordinates, and minister, 1975 Brigadier Olu Obasanjo.

Today, for good or for bad, you, Dr. Yakubu Gowon (GCFR), are the most senior of all living former Commanders-in Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces, despite whatever surreptitious disinformation that Obasanjo’s official praise singers, and image launderers may have overwhelmed the nervous systems of both Nigerians, and the world at large, about his assumed essence in Nigerian history.

We are therefore confident that you can advise President Olusegun Obasanjo appropriately, or, at least, bring considerable pressure to bear on him, in your capacity as the substantive boss of all living, active, or retired soldiers of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, including OBJ.

"Let There Be Light", And NEPA Struck:

Recent events in the country have shown unambiguously that Olu Obasanjo lacks a clear sense of mission on how best to confront the historical challenges facing present day Nigeria. You will recall when in 1970, some 32 years ago, then Lieutenant Colonel Obasanjo received, on your behalf, the article of surrender from then Major General Philip Effiong of the Biafran Army. For you and for all Nigerians then, it was symbolic of a new Nigeria. However, with the benefit of hindsight, it now seems like Obasanjo did not really share your altruism, and fervent desire of assuring all Nigerians that there is hope in a united Nigeria that Nigerians could trust their aspirations and destiny in, and rebuild from a firmer foundation, given the circumstances of those times. However, today, it appears as if the horrible experiences of the battlefronts of the Nigeria-Biafra War were for nothing.

It is dumbfounding, frightening, and ironic to observe that Nigerians tried their human best to remain united, only to be enslaved by a nightmarish catalogue of unwarranted misery brought about by a long succession of thick-skinned and mercenary despots, all of them, your subordinates, starting from Murtala Mohammed, through Olusegun Obasanjo, to

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Mohammadu Buhari, Ibrahim Babangia, Sani Abacha, Abdulsalami Abubakar, and now back to Olusegun Obasanjo, once again, making former President Alhaji Shehu Shagari (GCFR) appear like an odd statistic in the history of post- independence Nigeria.

Even before Obasanjo came to power on Saturday, 29 May 1999, there was a significant amount of goodwill towards him, which cut across sexual, economic, social, dogmatic, and ethnic barriers. Nigerians believed in Obasanjo because they thought that he would be the muster point of national reawakening, and that he was prepared to sacrifice his personal greed and selfishness for the benefit of Nigeria and all Nigerians. The myth was that Obasanjo was probably the most experienced Nigerian to lead this thoroughly brutalised nation, from a miasma of group masochism, self-hate, and economic ruination, to national renaissance. At that time, Olusegun Obasanjo hinged his election campaign on the smokescreen that he was the one, and probably only, Nigerian that Nigerians could depend on for accountability, and good governance.

However, today, some Nigerian men can effortlessly enslave, debase, dehumanise, demonise, or/and diabolise Nigerian women, or amputate peasant petty poachers, or instigate urban terrorism, or destroy every vestige of civilised coexistence in their neighbourhoods through general disorder, and very likely, President Olusegun Obasanjo would embrace such men warmly. All that matters is to him is that they line up as allies and "paddy men" in his self-recycling gambit to consolidate and entrench institutionalised predatory autocracy in Nigeria, since that is the only cause that he still takes seriously. That is the message that Obasanjo sent by his palpably lack-lustre response to the momentary insanity of the theocratic government of Zamfara State, which, incidentally, is the most impudently virulent anti-democratic violator of very basic human rights in the Federal Republic of Nigeria today, an unfortunate but typical manifestation of entrenched power sadism in Nigerian leaders nationwide.

A Fatuous Fatwa In A Democratic Theocracy:

The farcical and fatuous fatwa, pronounced recently by the so-called Deputy Governor of a supposedly democratic sub- component, called Zamfara State, of a supposedly democratic Federal Republic of Nigeria, His so-called Excellency, so- called Alhaji Mamuda Aliyu Shinkafi, in addition to other recent threats to the peace and general stability of Nigeria, makes the Government of Zamfara State, the prime sponsor, and flag bearer of dogma-energised terrorism in the ECOWAS sub-region, in case you do not know yet.

Yet, President Obasanjo rewarded that "rogue regime" for recklessly declaring yet another death sentence on yet another Nigerian woman, Ms. Isioma Daniels, by firstly denouncing her freedom of expression, and by insinuation, the freedom of the press in Nigeria, and then proceeding to arrest her colleague, an editor in ThisDay newspapers, after Isioma had fled Obasanjo’s investor-friendly Nigeria, sequel to the complete reduction to ashes of that newspaper’s office in Kaduna, by some dogma-addicted terrorists.

How very democratic!

The War against Women (WAW) has become the obsession of Nigeria’s religious bigots, fanatics, and terrorists alike, all of them, men. Sexual terrorism and/or gender chauvinism easily supersede all other priorities, preoccupations, or developmental concerns, wherever the virus strikes, particularly in Zamfara State, where dogma-energised state-sponsored terrorism flourishes unrestrained. How else could President Obasanjo have rewarded an intransigent state governor, who has repeatedly subjected the female half of the population of Zamfara State to a sustained reign of pure and unabashed terror, trauma, squalor, humiliation, and indignity, with so much audacity, in a country that claims to be part of the early

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21st century?

At no point in Nigerian history, have women and girls been more methodically, and blatantly abused than in Zamfara State today where, in the name of a madness masquerading as dogma, the government in Gusau deliberately tramples on their fundamental human rights. Just as it was, in the Taliban era in Afghanistan, pre-9/11, women may not appear in public without being covered "adequately", from head to toe, and from toenail to dandruff. They may not leave their homes without being accompanied by a "trusted" male family member. They are not allowed to attend the same schools with their fellow male students, or be treated by male doctors, particularly male gynaecologists, or travel in the same bus or taxi with male passengers, or ride on an "okada" that is piloted by a male rider. Yet, Nigerians fool themselves that their women, especially those of them in Zamfara State, have any constitutionally assured basic human rights, as citizens of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Nigerians are very worried about the implications of supposedly democratically elected, so-called Deputy Governor, so- called Alhaji Mamuda Aliyu Shinkafi’s fatwa, on the integrity, political influence, and authority of President Obasanjo’s government. The general impression that "Omo Oba" is presenting to the whole world is that, some Nigerians are at liberty to disregard the demands of civilised behaviour, and the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, since they can kill anyone who offends their personal myths, brainwaves, convictions, sentiments, dogmas, whims, or worldviews.

What if the so-called Executive Governor of Ms. Isioma Daniels’ state of origin stands firm, and issues a very strongly worded counter-statement, giving so-called Deputy Governor Alhaji Mamuda Aliyu Shinkafi an ultimatum to speedily retract his laughable so-called fatwa, failing which, all citizens of Zamfara State, be they Moslems, Christians, Animists, or Atheists, irrespective of their individual merits or perceived nuisance potential, would be considered, en-masse, as grave security risks, and repatriated peacefully, and systematically, maybe, by air-conditioned "luxurious" buses, to Zamfara State, in a manner very similar to what some Nigerians experienced, during those heady days in post-Aguiyi-Ironsi Nigeria in 1966 and 1967, shortly after the coup d’état, that was part-coordinated by the incumbent Minister of Defence, and your successor, and one time insubordinate field commander, Murtala Mohammed, that brought you into military politics, or/and in line with Major Gideon Orka’s model of expedited national sanitisation, salvation, and redemption. That could send a very loud and clear warning that the brazen over-indulgence of the Government of Zamfara State, in hard-core theocracy, glorified extremism, intolerance, bigotry, sexism, and/or covert urban terrorism, will not be tolerated in a democratic Federal Republic of Nigeria.

But then, Ms. Isioma Daniel’s so-called Executive Governor may be too petrified to challenge the impunity, given the possibility that Obasanjo would remind him about a tale of "no victors and no vanquished". Very likely, Ms. Isioma Daniel’s so-called Executive Governor may be very engrossed, wallowing in the hallucinations and euphoria induced by Chief Tony Anenih’s open political 419: a shameless strategy of pre-elections influence peddling, elections vote rigging, and post-elections joint abuse of office, treasury evacuation, and general brigandage by political soul mates, via the "adoption", and "endorsement" of some supposedly elected high performance governors, who are now routinely led by the nose by that unelected ex-Nigerian Policeman, gone bananas.

In fact, Ms. Isioma Daniel’s democratically elected so-called Executive Governor may be so busy planning, and putting final touches to various conspiracies, and intrigues aimed at strengthening his self-recycling project, in preparation for the 2003 gubernatorial elections, that he might not have sufficient focus even to think about the serious threat to the life of one of his citizens. Nevertheless, somebody just has to do something fast, if Chief Olusegun Obasanjo (psc; fss) will do nothing about naked sexual terrorism, and gender chauvinism in Nigeria. Please, the ball is in your court, our beloved and gracious elder statesman. Do something.

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Resurrecting A Dying Nation:

Please, Dr. Yakubu Gowon (GCFR; psc; fss; dss), do something. Kindly intervene with as much patriotism and nationalism that you can invoke, by appealing to civilian President Obasanjo to address these issues, with maximum despatch, in fact, with immediate effect. In other words, kindly advise him to prosecute and imprison the so-called Deputy Governor of Zamfara State, so-called Alhaji Mamuda Aliyu Shinkafi, for criminal incitement to premeditated terrorism, including other related crimes against humanity (like arson, and ethnic cleansing), without any further delay.

With the benefit of hindsight, we can now safely assert that, when Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe (Owele Onitsha, alias "Zik of Africa") and his fellow anti-colonial nationalist peer, Chief Obafemi Awolowo (SAN, alias "Leader of the Yoruba race"), could not resist the predictable lure to political recycling, came out from their well deserved retirement, and lost the elections in 1979, and in 1983, the heavens did not fall in Nigeria. Indeed, paradoxically, they helped to demystify themselves by themselves. Remember that even you, Dr. Yakubu Gowon, tried to make a "come back" in 1993, some eighteen (18) solid years after the Murtala-Olusegun junta sent you into self-exile. However, you lost gracefully at your ward in , and of course, the heavens did not fall in Nigeria.

Notice that Zik, Awo, and yourself, could not re-enter partisan politics, and win elections, after leaving office, not because you were not "credible", but because Nigerians needed you for other equally important tasks, beyond actively wielding ultimate political power in Nigeria. President Obasanjo was luckier, in the sense that he won a pre-determined selection contest, some 20 years after retiring as a four-star general, and as a former head of a military junta in Nigeria. Nevertheless, the past forty-two (42) months of President Obasanjo have been rather disappointing for Nigerians, to say the very least.

The path of honour for "nascent" President Olusegun Aremu Mathew Obasanjo (GCFR) now is to quietly, cheerfully, honourably, magnanimously and very soldier-gentlemanly back out of the 2003 presidential elections, as we know he would, and live the balance of his life, at peace with himself, as a respectable elder statesman, like yourself, and provide fatherly guidance, if requested to do so, from time to time, as appropriate, for the birth of a new Nigeria, that is founded in a long range vision of reciprocal respect, harmony, equity, transparency, and justice.

Actually, the prevailing season of anomie in Nigeria is a bitter conflict between a dying old country, led in the main, by abysmally corrupt political power prostitutes, and geriatric power sadist, presided over by Olusegun Obasanjo on the one hand, and an emergent nation state that urgently needs to be rebuilt on a foundation of prevailing global values and benchmarks of sound democratic governance, on the other hand.

Please, Dr. Yakubu Gowon, talk to Omo Oba, very seriously, because, quite unfortunately, he is letting you all down, I am talking about the original non-NDA-trained, Congolese jungle experts of the jolly good old Nigerian Army, which incidentally also includes your former seniors like Major Generals Adeyinka Adebayo (alias Brigadier Owambe), David Ejoor (alias Kèké), and General (Ikemba) Chukwu Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu (alias Rebel Leader).

If, however, you do not succeed in persuading Chief Olusegun Obasanjo to withdraw gracefully from the forthcoming presidential elections in 2003, as agreed and signed since 1998, then we, the very angry, but patient people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, will have no other alternative than to impeach him, very early next year, through our representatives and senators in the National Assembly, before the presidential elections, on grounds of imbecility and apparent insanity, failing which, we will resort to our usual fasting and praying, for prompt and summary divine intervention.

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This time around, just before Thursday, 29 May 2003, there suddenly will materialise, some six (6) very kámpé Nigerian whores, each representing their respective geopolitical zone, on solidarity visit from Italy, to the usual Aso Rock Villa Annexe guest house, before the customary presentation of a make-shift coffin for their chief host, as was the case when some gorgeous Indian ladies made a mysterious romantic curtsey call there, just before daybreak, on Monday, 8 June, 1998.

Barka de Sallah, Merry Christmas, and a peaceful Nigeria after Thursday, 29 May 2003, when Obasanjo would have gladly, gracefully, humbly, honourably, gentlemanly, soldier-manly, and cheerfully handed over the Presidency of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, to the total and everlasting glory of God, and for the sake of a much better Nigeria, than Obasanjo can handle.

Definitely, to keep Nigeria one, is a task that must be done (by all means necessary).

Go on with one Nigeria, but please, let us pray harder! (for, and on behalf of 125.73 million very angry, but effectively prayerful Nigerians worldwide).

I welcome your comments (via e-mail: [email protected]), and encourage this article to be freely reproduced, photocopied, scanned, faxed, reprinted, reformatted, broadcast, digitised, uploaded or downloaded, in whatever manner or form, with or without acknowledgement.

December 2002

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