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By Ehichioya Ezomon
“He who is begged or pleaded with is king,” is an adage that the average Edo person doesn’t take for granted, mostly if the act for which forgiveness is sought is committed publicly – such that the aggrieved feels slighted and injured – and the mollification is also displayed openly.
Edo State Governor Godwin Obaseki aptly symbolically assumes a kingly position lately, as he exhibits the spirit of divine, to forgive Deputy Governor Philip Shaibu, who’d “erred” by aspiring to succeed Obaseki in 2024.
It’s Shaibu’s inalienable right to aspire to be governor in an off-season election in September 2024, to round-off Obaseki’s eight-year tenure in November 2024. But Obaseki reckoned the act as in bad faith and taste.
Deputy governors aren’t satisfied with playing second fiddle, and they begin plotting how to become the chief executive the day after their swearing in. To justify their aspiration, some deputy governors boast of influencing the governor’s pick for the position.
But woe betide the deputy governor, who thinks the influence of their godfather will carry them through after the governor has assumed the full powers of office. And most times, their political benefactors become their first victims.
In Nigeria’s brand of democracy in which the Constitution clothes the governor with powers of overlordship that subsume other authorities – ancient and modern – the deputy governor is laughably a “spare tire,” who owes his stay in office to the benevolence of the governor, and thus should be heard and not seen, or they risk being rendered redundant in the scheme, or hounded out of office when they want to assert their authority.
A deputy governor can hardly survive risking relationships with their principals on account of aspiring to succeed them. It’s either the governor engineers the mostly pliant members of the State House of Assembly to impeach the deputy governor over nebulous allegations of “gross misconduct,” or their powers are curtailed, and access to the governor and state activities limited or frozen.
Such was the fate that befell Shaibu in his undisguised ambition to be governor in 2024. To clear all roadblocks, he filed suits in courts, to pre-empt Obaseki deploying the State Assembly to impeach him and scuttle his ambition.
Obaseki felt that Shaibu had gone about the project in a manner that betrayed their cordial relationship since they came together in a joint ticket on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2016, and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2020.
To Obaseki, who’d dealt with his acclaimed political godfather and predecessor in office, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole – culminating in the now Senator for Edo North being sacked by the courts as national chairman of the APC – Shaibu’s a small fry to make mincemeat of.
Thus, he cut communications with, and barred Shaibu from accessing him; stopped him from certain official activities, and relocated his office to outside the Government House, Benin City, via a two-para memo dispatched by the secretary to the State Government, Mr Osarodion Ogie, dated September 15, and received on September 19.
The memo, ‘Relocation of Office Accommodation,’ reads: “I write to inform you that His Excellency, the Governor, has approved the relocation of your office accommodation to No 7, Dennis Osadebey Avenue, G.R.A., Benin City.
“You are therefore requested to ensure your compliance in line with Mr Governor’s approval, please.”
Surprisingly, Shaibu, after resuming in the new office, tendered his apology to Obaseki.
The months-long political feud between Obaseki and Shaibu had the potential to threaten the peace and security of the proudly homogeneous Edo State dubbed the “Heart Beat of The Nation.”
Particularly on the verge of getting dragged and enmeshed in the murky waters of politics and personal ambitions were the people of Edo South and Edo North, where Obaseki and Shaibu hail from, respectively.
But before Obaseki could twist the screw further, well-meaning Nigerians stepped in to engender truce, leading to Shaibu’s withdrawal of his writs in the courts, and offering “sincere apologies” to Obaseki for whatever his follies.
Shaibu told journalists in Benin City on September 21 that: “I will use this medium to appeal to Mr. Governor, if there is anything that I don’t know that I have done, please forgive me, so that we can develop our state together.
“If there is any mistake that I have made as human, is (sic) not an act of maybe wickedness, because I’m not wicked. I have a very clean heart.
“So Mr Governor, please, if there is anything that you think I have done, I am sorry. I need us to work together to finish well and strong because that is my prayer for you.”
Shaibu vouched for his loyalty to Obaseki, and said he’d taken a personal vow with God to support the governor, stressing that, “If I have a vow with God, there is nothing that will change it.”
He hoped for a return of the good old days with Obaseki, saying: “And I can only wish that the relationship that we had, in the next few days and weeks, I know it will come back… We’ve been the envy of the entire country; it (cordial relationship) is still possible.”
Exactly one week after, on September 28, Shaibu’s prayers were answered, as Obaseki, touting himself as a “person of faith,” said he’s “under obligation to accept the apology.”
In a letter, “Re: Public Apology By The Edo State Deputy Governor, Philip Shaibu,” Obaseki said: “I have noted the public apology made by the Deputy Governor of Edo State, His Excellency, Rt. Hon. Comrade Philip Shaibu. This apology followed an aberrant behaviour that contradicts what the people of Edo State stand for.
“To name a few, the Deputy Governor needlessly filed unfounded petitions in the Nigerian courts restraining me, the State House of Assembly and Security agencies from a non-existent impeachment process, followed by repeated breaches of protocol; unwarranted and unprovoked attacks in the media on my person and the State Government.
“The media frenzy as a result of the above and more, provided an impression of crises that has been precarious and distasteful to Edo people in the State and across the world.
“Although these unwarranted provocations caused me severe personal discomfort, as a person of faith, I am under obligation to accept this apology because as they say, ‘to err is human, to forgive is divine.”
“In good faith, I trust that the public apology as expressed by the Deputy Governor is genuine and followed by contrite steps to improve his conflict resolution skills.
“I also enjoin the Deputy Governor to guide his proxies to act in accordance with his piety.”
“It is my sincere hope and that of my other colleagues in government and all well-meaning Edo people, that these rhetorics will be put to an end forthwith to enable this administration finish strong and deliver the dividends of democracy to the greatest number of Edo people over this final twelve (12) months.”
Governor Obaseki deserves some plaudits! Yet, the swords sheathed, and the guns silenced, the lessons learned should endure, as political ambition die hard. For Shaibu – and many in his shoes – the ultimate is to be in full control as the Executive Governor, despite being deputy for eight years. Nothing else suffices!
So, unless the “terms of the truce” for apology and forgiveness include total surrender of Shaibu’s ambition, the battle may be over, but the war will continue till September 2024. And it’ll be epic in proportion and ramifications on both sides!
* Mr Ezomon, journalist and media consultant, writes from Lagos, Nigeria.
