By Eneh John
“The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.”-Ayn Rand
For sixteen years, the People’s Democratic Party held our country hostage with their warped programs and expired ideologies. Nigerians meant nothing to them. It was a free for all season. It was either you agree with them or you ship out.
Impunity was the word, Misrule was the anthem. Until a president like Umaru Musa Yara’dua emerged to give us a glimpse of hope in the rule of law, we were left as smallest minorities in Nigeria.
There is always a day of reckoning for any individual or group irrespective of time.
There was no other time to end PDP’s misrule, than in 2015. I recollect the build up to the 2007 governorship elections in Lagos state when Obasanjo boasted in a large crowd that Lagos must be taken by PDP.
Underrating Obasanjo’s statement was like tempting a goat with a yam. The indefagtible Bola Ahmed Tinubu went back to the table and started working with the Fashola project. It was a failed project for PDP yet again in Lagos state as Fashola emerged.
Today, the elections have come and gone, but it memories will linger for a long time.
It wasn’t a contest between Buhari and Jonathan, it was a contest between MISRULE and the supposed minorities in Nigeria.
The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) chairman, Adamu Muazu graciously led the once biggest street party group to the hangman. When a story was published on how Muazu resigned his position as National chairman, the PDP in a bid to save herself of the embarrassment went out to deny the story after the Emir of Bauchi had talked Muazu into rescinding his decision. He did as he was instructed and denied ever resigning his post.
With counter accusations between the mistaken governor of Ekiti state and Muazu, the drama keeps unfolding.
Muazu who is presently in Tunis having a swell time with his cash, while the foot soldiers and PDP e-rats go to town selling stories to the public that their chairman is ill.
Even if Buhari fails in his administration as Nigeria’s president, never again will the PDP take power at the centre in this country. A new party will rather emerge and get to the presidency than PDP returning.
The once treasured umbrella is now leaking, with its occupants scampering for safety in APC.
In the PDP, it has been me, me, me…
My family, my family, my family…
I see PDP more as a street club than a political party.
Although a few sincere persons still exist in the club, but it is wise that the ship should sail successfully to its abode with them as captains than who they presently have.
Now that Adamu Muazu is sinking, will the occupants of this ship also sink with him?
I will not be surprise because their slogan has always been dying together.
A party that boasted that it will rule Nigeria for sixty years. But I keep asking, how was the pregnancy terminated? That they couldn’t even do twenty years of their sixty years.
The words of PDP then was power…the word power intoxicated its leaders to a point that they were now the description of power itself.
Rights and privileges of people meant nothing to them anymore.
In so far as you could answer yes sir, to your masters, you were termed a loyal servant.
Refusal meant disloyalty, which was accompanied with punishment.
But just as James Ene Henshaw’s book title: “This is our chance,” Nigerians said No with their votes. A bloodless civilian coup was performed in the different polling units in the country.
Joining the PDP was like empowerment to the people.
People needed to get identity.
The identification was the party tag.
A shattered umbrella, a ship with sinking captains.
But who will stir this troubled ship to a safe haven?
When a captain of a ship is sinking, the ship will have to go with its sailor.
It is advisable that the genuine lovers of this ship should rescue their ship from the troubled waters and the hands of a drowning captain.
A REPUTATION FOUNDED ON INTEGRITY MUST BE NURTURED BY TRUTH.
Eneh John is a Journalist and Secretary, Coalition of Human Rights Defenders(COHRD)
E-mail: [email protected]
