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Why The APC Must Stay True To Justice By Olanrewaju Ajiboye

All is said to be "fair in love and war." But another saying of wisdom is that there should be “honor among thieves.”

It is expected. When the good, the bad and the ugly grouped under a common cause that subdued the ugliest, there must be a fallout after the victory.

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The dilemma is that without the combination of war secrets of the good, the bad and the ugly, there was no way the ugliest could have been dislodged.

The chicken is coming home to roost and this is the time for the people of goodwill, people of peace and people of conscience to bend backward over to appeal to all sides of the victorious triumvirate in APC to embrace the spirit of give and take and where that is impossible, ‘the good’ in the group should be persuaded to sacrifice the more in order to avoid a situation where an untimely stitch of a laceration cannot save nine, or even snowballing beyond the status quo ante of the era of 'the ugliest’ that necessitated the coming together of the good, the bad and ugly in the first instance, to halt the assured precipice destination of the ugliest.

All is said to be "fair in love and war." But another saying of wisdom is that there should be “honor among thieves.”

In case the above narrative is not lucid enough, the concern is for the seemingly innocuous but deeply invidious discord that is quietly raging within the APC on the account of the power struggle among the groups of the good, the bad and the ugly that circumstances and necessities forced to come together in pursuit of a common interest: to defeat the behemoth called PDP.

Applying literature fictions may not drive home the point as giving practical examples from within our own history as a country after a union of mutual suspicions was successfully delivered on 1st of October, 1960.

The parliamentary system was the system adopted at Nigeria’s independence. There were politics of desperation among various political interests and individuals. Were all those practitioners to be recalled today and given the same opportunity, in the same scenario, with the consequences that followed their actions and inactions, many of them would be wiser and would do things differently.

It was a minor imbalance and a few missteps that eventually led to a chain of consequences that continues to haunt us as a people and as a country.

For more clarity, the employment and deployment of surreptitiousness in politics and governance by all players of the period in question snowballed from a small crisis to a massive hurricane of negative occurrences that brought death, dislocation, imprisonment, coups and countercoups and more unfortunately a ‘pogrom’ that led to further bloodshed in a fratricidal war. The war has robbed us of potential erudite scholars, industrialists, scientists, teachers, philanthropists, inventors and so many others.

Just as the players in APC are refusing to learn from history now, it was the same in the second republic after a break that was sufficient enough to mellow the memory of the unfortunate occurrences of the first republic.

Major players of the period especially those at the center were pliant to acts of perfidy, subterfuge, domination and unwholesome electioneering processes. The refusal to learn by the rule culminated in the truncation of the democratic process that had been badly desecrated upon to justify its abrupt end. Again, it brought about anguish, pains, abridgement of freedom and personal liberty and even deaths in custody of some members of the elite and their cronies who were players in the ousted government.

Mutual distrust and intra-group rebellion almost brought the country to a cliff through the deceit and shenanigans of the military government that had ousted the previous military regime, which itself had earlier dislodged the democratic government that had lost legitimacy on the account of skewed 1983 general elections.

Another very good example is the third republic debacle. Intra-party squabbles of the then victorious SDP that had yet to assume power cracked the wall for the lizards in the then major opposition, the NRC to perch the inner walls of the victorious party, the SDP, even though the election was fraudulently regarded inconclusive, a situation the third force, the military, capitalized upon to seize power.

Just like today’s APC, the then Social Democratic Party SDP, though a contraption of a fraudulent military government, was an amalgamation of the good, the bad and the ugly. An undesirable supremacy contest from among the groups, insignificant as it appeared metamorphosed into a bigger and bitter intrigue that resulted in far-reaching undesired consequences.

So far-reaching were its spiral effects that it almost imploded the country. It resulted in the deaths of many ordinary citizens and it also claimed the lives of many members of the elite, be it from the political elite or the military or professional groups. It consumed the life of the personage at the center of it all, M.K.O. Abiola, who incidentally is being remembered today since he died 17 years ago.

The most recent history the APC ought to learn from is the causes and effects of what led to their having the opportunity to be in government. If the PDP had embraced the spirit of give and take, humility and pro-activeness, perhaps their desire to rule for sixty years would have at least yielded them another four years in government vide the March 28, 2015 election.  But due to their arrogance and misreading of the capacity of whitlow to affect the entire body comfort, which is the path of self-destruction presently touted by the APC.

In other words, the APC represents three groups: a) 'the true believers,’ who are ‘the good’; b) ‘the double thinkers,’ who are ‘the bad’; and lastly, c) ‘the opportunists,’ who are ‘the ugly’. A “no retreat, no surrender” situation among the groups forebodes danger for the whole country, hence the need to leave no stone unturned in order for the different groups in APC to secure the social contract they entered into, which is to gain power and implement changes in how government is run.

As a patriotic citizen and an incurable optimist in Nigeria, where rule of law, good governance, freedom and liberty as well as the smooth transfer of power reign supreme, this privilege is to admonish and also to persuade the true believer group within the APC to sheathe their swords.

The true believer group should borrow wisdom from the Bible account of the dispute between two women who were contesting the ownership of a child and the matter was taken before Solomon the King. When King Solomon pulled a fast one on both women and suggested that the child in contention would be cut into two, the liar mother consented, but the real mother pleaded that the child should rather be given to the impostor mother rather than the innocent child be killed.

The wisdom for the true believer group in the story is that they have everything to lose should the problem incubate and hatch into a monster. The true believers have been very consistent in their belief that Nigeria can be better reengineered, redirected and put on the path of greatness, ideals they have long suffered for. The double thinkers in APC are like parasites whose only philosophy for survival is to do so at the expense of others. Lastly, the opportunists in the party’s midst stand for no principle, no honor, and no integrity. They are lepers who lack the understanding to make cheese but can spill milk in seconds.  If a war is avoidable by sacrificing for peace so be it, because though war can bring peace, it does so at a greater expense unless it is inevitable.

The APC is a beautiful edifice meticulously envisioned by a small group of patriots who, however, must solicit the support of the bad and the ugly due to the deep flaw in democracy as a system of government. The real APC dreamers who are living their dreams must do everything by demonstrating uncanny calmness and perseverance to survive this harrowing period. The APC must survive; Nigeria must change for the better.

Long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

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Politics