Things are no longer at ease within the APC; the centre is not merely strained, it is being violently convulsed by an earthquake it neither anticipated nor prepared for.
The Ibadan Declaration landed like a thunderclap at the very core of the APC’s strategic machinery. It did not simply rattle the engine room; it shattered the control centre entirely. What remains is a spectacle of confusion – men dazed, disoriented, and scrambling in all directions in search of scapegoats, while resorting, as is their custom, to a flood of falsehoods and calculated distortions.
Without equivocation, Governor Seyi Makinde is fast emerging as one of the most resolute voices in defence of a democracy now perilously imperilled under the heavy hand of Bola Tinubu’s increasingly autocratic order. While the APC reveled in its grand designs to suffocate dissent and extinguish opposition, Makinde, ever the apostle of diplomacy over brute force; moved with precision and audacity, orchestrating the Ibadan Declaration that has since disrupted their carefully laid schemes. It is to his credit that a weary nation can momentarily exhale, and that the ordinary Nigerian dares once again to entertain hope – hope for reprieve from what many perceive as a failing, overbearing, and indifferent regime.
True to form, however, the APC, even in disarray; has chosen to manufacture outrage where none exists, twisting the governor’s words in a desperate bid to diminish the significance of the moment. Makinde’s reference to “Operation Wetie” of the 1960s was a sober invocation of history, not an incitement to chaos. Only the willfully obtuse, or politically dishonest, would distort a historical caution into a call for anarchy. History, after all, has an unsettling habit of repeating itself when its warnings are ignored.
Tinubu and his hardline acolytes would do well to listen – truly listen – rather than retreat into denial. The governor’s message was clear – when the will of the people is consistently subverted, consequences inevitably follow. It was a warning, not a war cry. Yet, in a system where even clarity is inconvenient, such nuance is deliberately sacrificed on the altar of propaganda.
If the APC possessed even a fraction of the outrage it now feigns, it might have directed it toward the alarming rhetoric of Nyesom Wike, who publicly threatened “to shoot” a journalist, Seun Okinbaloye, on national television. That brazen outburst, dangerous, incendiary, and wholly unbecoming, was met with deafening silence from the same quarters now crying wolf.
Can we now mention what Buhari said about “soaking the Baboons in blood” or Gbajabiamila’s statement for their supporters to: “scatter everything”? Those highly inflammatory statements did not cause any uproar within the APC.
The hypocrisy is as glaring as it is shameless.
One is left to conclude that in Tinubu’s Nigeria, there exist two parallel codes: one indulgent and forgiving for loyal enforcers of the regime’s will, and another harsh and unforgiving for those who dare dissent. The comparison to darker chapters in African political history becomes less far-fetched with each passing day, How much different is today’s Nigeria, from the days of Idi-Amin Dada of Uganda?
Equally laughable is the latest fiction peddled by the APC and amplified by its ever-reliable town crier, Ayo Fayose, that Makinde allegedly paid a staggering ₦10 billion to secure political advantage. Such claims, devoid of evidence and dripping with desperation, belong squarely in the theatre of the absurd. Those who see politics solely as a marketplace of transactions inevitably assume that every actor is for sale. Integrity, to such minds, is an alien concept. It’s called ‘poverty of the soul’.
I challenge those peddling the silly rumour to produce proof – if any exists beyond their fertile imaginations. Until then, these allegations remain what they have always been – the fevered inventions of men afflicted by moral bankruptcy.
As the saying goes, the wind that has blown from Ibadan has exposed more than mere intrigue, it has laid bare the fragility of a political order built on manipulation, control and outright muscling of any strong opposition. The tide, it would appear, is turning.
Nigeria, though battered, is not broken. Its democratic spirit, though tested, endures. And as 2027 approaches, the contest will not merely be for power, but for the very soul of the republic. Nigerians will speak and they will speak loudly!
Dare Adeleke writes from Ibadan.
