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Atiku Abubakar and the sexual history of the Nigerian presidency

Published

5 years ago

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In early 2014, the Zimbabwean public sphere literally caught fire. Rumours that the country’s former Prime Minister and the presidential candidate of the Movement for Democratic Change, (MDC) Morgan Tsvangirai, had suffered “a nasty blow from below,” euphemism for zero virility, spread like bushfire. At about the same time, the virility-restoring prowess of Emmanuel Makandiwa, a ‘miracle-working’ Pentecostal prophet, froze the stratosphere like snowflakes in winter. Estranged wife of Tsvangirai, Elizabeth Macheka, had lit the fire. In an interview she granted The Herald, which was entitled, Why I ditched Tsvangirai: Wife Macheka had been quoted to have said that she had separated from Tsvangirai due to ‘sensitive personal issues’ and that this was known to her and Tsvangirai alone and which only the two of them could resolve.

The above story was told by Wale Adebanwi, highly respected scholar, in a recently published journal article he entitled The Carnality of Power. Therein, Adebanwi had explored the centrality and virility of power and how men of power, through their libido, use sex as a locus of power, as well as how all of us, scholars, lay scholars and society as a whole, “need to pay greater attention to the ways in which obscenity can help explain the nature of power. 

For a Zimbabwean public that salivated on riveting gossips and rumours in high and low places, Macheka’s statement was the confirmation it needed for a high-quality rumour it hitherto circulated. In whooshing whispers and mouth-to-ear transmission, the former prime minister was said to have been afflicted by an “under-neath,” below-the-trousers problem of ‘erectile dysfunctional disorder.’ The Herald did not also help matters. It immediately and unabashedly tagged what Macheka dubbed ‘sensitive personal issues’ as ‘a medical one.’ Thereafter, Fungai Machirori, Zimbabwean journalist and blogger, did a salacious piece on the issue which she entitled, Of Penises, Politics and Pentecostalism in Zimbabwe, an essay which she called an “exposé of trouble in the un-paradise that is Tsvangirai’s love life’’

As the story went, in the bid to seek spiritual remedy for the restoration of his numb member, Tsvangirai had to make a sudden visit to Nigeria to meet the infamous miracle-hawking pastor, T. B. Joshua, now late. Joshua had been catapulted to the zenith of Zimbabweans and Southern Africans in general’s migration to his shrine for spiritual patronage due to a 2012 prophecy he made that an African leader who he said was ‘old and unwell,’ would die. At the exit of Malawian president, Bingu wa Mutharika,, the popular belief was that Joshua was ‘spiritually powerful.’ However, Macheka, unable to contain the penile starvation from Tsvangirai, had packed her things and fled her marital home.

The Zimbabwean yellow press world immediately interpreted this visit to Lagos by Tsvangirai as a spirited spiritual search for cure to what Adebanwi tagged his “double jeopardy” – an under-the-trousers virility trouble and a dwindling political fortune.

In his own penis-restoration evangelism, Makandiwa, who is the founder of the Zimbabwe-popular United Family International Church (UFIC), was said to have, during a New Year’s Day service, performed “a penis-enhancing miracle” on a Namibian. The penal calamity that the Namibian suffered from was said to be such that his private member was “the size of a two-year-old’s” and because of this phallic deficiency, he had to run from pillar to post so as to be able to prevent his own “Macheka” from eloping. In the report of what transpired, Prophet Makandiwa had reportedly commanded the Namibian’s miniature member to “arise!” and thereafter, according to an eyewitness, “first month grow, second month grow, third month grow, fourth month grow, fifth month, ummm stop,” such that, “the organ must have grown exponentially until the prophet decreed it to stop.”

For those who think less of the power of sex in high places, Oscar Wilde, Irish poet and playwright, was ready to shock them. “Everything in the world is about sex, except sex. Sex is about power,” he had written. Scholars have taken the Wilde libidinous theorising further to say that there is an intersection between gender, sexual power and political power. So in the analysis of political power, a belittling of sex and sexual power could be a barren pursuit. Indeed, as Adebanwi said, there is an expectation that “the African man of power must display or exhibit his virility – particularly sexual virility.”

Last week, the place of sex in the Nigerian presidency became an issue of discourse. 2019 presidential candidate, presidential hopeful in the 2023 presidential election and former Nigerian Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, had suffered a fate though not similar to Tsvangirai’s but not totally dissimilar to it. Linking both is a single thread of marital dislocation, a desire by one partner in a patrimony to discontinue on a sexual voyage, though ostensibly for different reasons.  Atiku Abubakar’s own “Macheka,” Jennifer Iwenjiora Douglas Abubakar, until now his wife and a former Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) correspondent in the 1980s, had gone to her own “The Herald” last Tuesday to narrate that her marriage to the stupendously wealthy politician named Turaki had broken down irretrievably with effect from June 26, 2021. Jennifer had loomed large as subject of a probe some 12 years ago by the United States Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, chaired by Senator Carl Levin, alleging that she, in cahoots with her husband, had funneled slush funds allegedly stolen from the Nigerian government, into America.

“The core reason for the divorce was disagreement over my continued stay in the United Kingdom, to look after my children and several other long-standing issues. I needed to play the role of a mother at this time to the children who have gone through the absence of both father and mother growing up; especially, with the passage of my elder sister who used to look after them,” said Douglas, alongside issues of disagreements over ownership of Turaki’s Nigerian, Dubai and UK properties.

Respected columnist and serial Facebook posts activist, Kayode Samuel, had put the sexual/power implication of the matrimonial squabble in perspective. In a post he made immediately the Atiku-Jennifer divorce became public knowledge, he had written, “Dear Igbo babes, it seems a vacancy may soon be coming up (or has already come up!) for a new wife in the home of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. The federal character-compliant attribute of his household was one of his strong selling points at the last elections. Now that his Igbo wife is leaving, I’m sure the old man would be thinking of making up her quota in time for 2023. So, up your game “sharperly“, ezigbo nwanyi oma! I won’t be charging anything for this piece of pricey intelligence. I’ll just take it to be part of my nwanwa duties…” Jennifer hailed from the Onitsha area of Anambra State.

Nigeria’s serial presidential candidate, the Turaki, seems to share fate with Zimbabwe’s Tsvangirai. Tsvangirai, aged 61, is “married as many times as he has lost in his bid to become Zimbabwe’s elected president.” This seems to be Abubakar’s lot too. Basking under the Islamic libidinous latitude which allows him to marry four wives, the Turaki went ahead to federal-characterized his libido by marrying Titi from Osun State, as well as other undisclosed women who must be from the northern part of Nigeria. Today however, Abubakar is facing his own double jeopardy of carnality and politics, like Tsvangira.

The political carnality jeopardy the Turaki is battling has to do with the fact that, Emperor Nyesom Wike and the Young Turk governors of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) like the Namibian’s shrinking manhood, seem to have shrunk the spatial chance of presidential contestation in the PDP against Abubakar whose presidential aspiration’s cloud seems to be dimming. For a man ravaged by serial allegations of corruption during his tenure as Vice President and whose strongest credential for the Nigerian presidency is his democratic – if you like, laissez fare – under-the-trousers personal economy, having had wives from the three geopolitical zones of Nigeria, unlike his challengers whose libido is tribalistic and ostensibly unidirectional, Abubakar’s loss of Jennifer Douglas, a major tripod of his credential, could be a mortal political, rather than a familial blow, in the proportion of Tsvangirai’s loss of masculinity. The question many people are asking is, was Jennifer actually being reticent on the real reason(s) she had to do a Micheka on her own Tsvangirai?

Counterpoising Tsvangirai’s “blow from below” image are some African presidents who were “perceived to have used their manhood well.” In Nigeria, we had the goggled dictator, General Sani Abacha, who though multiple attempts have been made to impeach the narrative of how he died, but over whom the prevailing facts on the streets have prevailed, one of which is that, he died after consuming poisoned apple fruits administered by stealth by the CIA and using Viagra to pump up his virility while working on two Indian prostitutes imported for him at the presidential Villa. Another was late dictator President Gnasingbe Eyadema of Togo, renowned with an elephantine sexual appetite as huge as the Basilica in the Ivorian city of Yamoussoukro. He was known for always sleeping with wives of his male ministers and his few female ministers. One of the ministers, said to have been blessed with an ‘especially attractive’ wife, had to hide her from Eyadéma so that he would not lay his lecherous paws on her. In this virility league was also the late Zairean dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko. Mobutu was said to be as lecherous as a he-goat. This is not to forget the father of them all, the former South African president, Jacob Zuma, who is said to have married at least six times.

In Africa, when a man of power “uses his manhood well,” he is seen as not being effeminate as Tsvangirai. If he is then “blessed” with an imposing virility, whether he uses it licitly or illicitly, this easily gains traction, making his rule to be seen as dominant and domineering. Another example in this regard is Robert Mugabe, who never hid the illicitness of his virility and who had been dating Grace, who he later married, even before his late wife’s death.

The man of power who possesses the Eyadema, Zuma and Mobutu image of a libidinous behemoth in Nigeria’s power calculus is Olusegun Obasanjo. During the Petroleum Trust Development Fund (PTDF) saga when he and Abubakar aimed at each other’s jugular, Atiku had alleged that Obasanjo bought a 607 Peugeot car for a woman friend who resided in Abeokuta with slush funds accruing from the PTDF scandal. Like Mugabe, Obasanjo was then married to Stella, who was Nigeria’s First Lady. In 2018, Obasanjo’s son, Gbenga, even alleged in a court affidavit that his father was having an affair with his wife, Moji. Mrs. Patricia Etteh, the former Speaker of the House of Representatives, was also rumoured to be Obasanjo’s woman friend. In The Carnality of Power, Adebanwi talked about “one prominent and ‘internationally respected’ West African president (who was) famous for breaking meetings – even abroad – to have a ‘quickie’ with his countless paramours.”

Indeed, Nigeria had been “lucky” to have occupiers of the seat of power whose sexual virility was benumbing. Military President Ibrahim Babangida reportedly went out of Dodan Barracks to demonstrate the strength of his awesome libido. In a 2013 book he authored entitled Honour for Sale: An inside account of the murder of Dele Giwa, a military aide to Babangida, Major Debo Basorun, wrote about how, on a trip to France, late First Lady, Mrs. Maryam Babangida, literally pummeled her husband for his presidential libidinous rascality.

Taking the opportunity of a long official meeting he had that dragged into the thin hours of the morning, IBB had engaged a paramour in a liaison whose dalliance with her husband Maryam got to know through the scent of her perfume in IBB’s hotel suite. Dealing the General heavy blows under locked door, when the Better Life for Rural Women proprietress eventually opened the door to IBB’s scared aides who had been ordered by a senior officer to prise the door open upon hearing noise of violence in the suite, they saw a C-in-C, renowned for his braggadocio that “we are not only in office but in power” whose face had been pockmarked by bruises from feminine paws. He was panting amid sweats, with a roughened military service dress which had some buttons torn off by a woman scorned into fury by the stray libido of her husband.

Those who knew Muhammadu Buhari as a young military officer claim that he too sowed wild oats too like his colleagues. They said he specifically coveted liaisons with mountainous posteriors. However, age and ill health would seem to have dealt a blow on that fancy. While emerging from the throes of a health challenge and on a visit to Angela Merkel of Germany and he was asked about the place of his wife in his government, Buhari had attempted to communicate his virility and masculinity, like an African who sees sex as conquest and show of power. He seemed to be saying that he had an active “under-neath” that ill health could not upstage. His wife, according to him, belonged to “zi oza room,” a euphemism for a hot libido. This sense was probably what a social media virility fabricator was about when he sent out a picture of Aisha Buhari, the First Lady, which went viral recently, a picture that had been touched to bear a protruded belly, suggestive of a Buhari who hadn’t gone the way of Morgan Tsvangirai.

In all, as Prof Adebanwi counsels, if we carefully rummage the lurid, the grotesque, the salacious stories of their Sex-cellencies – even at state levels with the governors – we may find anchors to how power politics in Nigeria and Africa can be explained through sex. Similarly, as Zimbabwean journalist and blogger, Fungai Machirori, told us, we may need to study the sexual histories of our men in power because, from the rhythm of the silent but jangling bells of the dangling penises of men in power, a silent compass to their politics may just as well be hiding.

 

Dr. Festus Adedayo, a Journalist and Columnist writes from Ibadan

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Governor Seyi Makinde’s Media Chat: A Hundred And Twenty Minutes Of Trash Talk | By Sola Abegunde

Published

4 days ago

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October 13, 2026

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I knew that Governor Makinde would provide us with a hundred and twenty minutes of comic relief and at the same time, I knew he is bound to commit unforced errors which would further expose his shenanigans.

The outgoing Governor of Oyo state did not disappoint on both fronts.

Personally, I understand the need for him to have one final valedictory Media Chat.

The atmosphere might be too hot for him to even think of such luxury after the general election in 2027. So, if he’s got the opportunity now, why not take a shot at it?

I must however say that the Governor displayed his insensitivity right from the choice of the Studio the Chat was aired.

Shortly before the Media Chat commenced, I came across a release signed by the Chairman of the Nigeria Union of Journalist, NUJ, BCOS Chapel, Com. Ademola Balogun.

Com. Balogun was full of lamentations concerning the very terrible state of the Oyo state Broadcasting Corporations, BCOS.

He was of the very strong opinion that the BCOS should have meaningful opportunities to cover Government activities.

He also called on Governor Seyi Makinde to empower the BCOS to invest in modern studio, transmitting equipment, digital broadcasting facilities and online platforms.

Com. Ademola spoke extensively about Staff welfare and other issues.

Sadly, while Governor Seyi Makinde has been consistent in empowering a particular Radio station, the Broadcasting Corporations of Oyo state, BCOS has been dying slowly.

Unfortunately, I have no good news for Com. Ademola. His lamentations will definitely fall on stone deaf ears. It is too late for Governor Makinde to change his ways. I just pray that the Governor would not wake up one day and sold off whatever remains of the Corporation.

That is just by the way. Let me address Governor Makinde’s Media Chat for whatever it is worth. The Governor spent a whole two hours venting anger and spreading outright lies and half-truths.

I am surprised that Governor Makinde has not seen any reason for him to have a second thought about his awkward and reckless comments about the Law Profession.

I am saying this because, for the second time, his Deputy was sitting closely beside him and yet, he felt like it was humorous for him to take a dig at Senator Sarafadeen Abiodun Alli, the All Progressives Congress, APC Gubernatorial candidate, regarding his misconceived failure as a Law practitioner.

He repeated the ignorant and reckless comments about Senator Alli, not being a Senior Advocate of Nigeria and for that reason, according to Governor Seyi Makinde, the Oyo South Senator is not an accomplished Legal Practitioner.

He had made that same reckless comments a couple of weeks ago and at that time also, the Deputy Governor was beside him!

The respectable man is an accomplished Lawyer of many years of experience, who had trained a lot of successful Lawyers.

I also wonder, how people like Dr. Nureni Adeniran and Olasunkanmi Olaleye, who are also Lawyers and have been working with Governor Seyi Makinde over the years would feel about those reckless comments coming from their Boss.

If you want to follow Governor Seyi Makinde’s reasoning, if you are a teacher and you did not rise to the status of a School Principal or Head teacher, then, you’re a failure.

If you are a Military Personnel and you didn’t rise to the position of a General, you’re a failure!

Any time I saw the Governor arguing in this regard, I always asked myself if he was actually himself, because, for me, only a drunkard is capable of reasoning in that manner, or, perhaps, some young elements who had taken so much banned substances.

I have carefully analyzed the 120 minutes Media Chat and I saw that Governor Seyi Makinde spent so much time treating two issues.

The first, being his frustration about his perceived betrayal by president Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the second being his failed attempt to rewrite the Constitution of Nigeria regarding the financial autonomy for Local Governments.

The birthday boy tried to work him through the crisis at the Circular Road, but it was obvious that the main reasons behind Governor Makinde’s Media Chat were grounded on his firm beliefs that Tinubu breached certain agreements with him and others in 2023 and his warped opinion about how the Local Governments should operate within our Federation.

Let’s start with Governor Seyi Makinde’s allegations against Tinubu.

According to him, in 2023, an agreement was signed between certain individuals, including himself.

He said there was an agreement that a Government of National Unity would be formed by president Tinubu after he won the presidential election of 2023 and that he and the Governor of Lagos state, Babajide Sanwo-Olu were signatories to that agreement.

According to him, president Tinubu was not a signatory to the agreement but he was informed after the agreement was signed!

He went further to say that on the strength of that agreement, he presented Bimbo Adekambi as a Ministerial nominee because the president had earlier told him that he wanted to appoint the Minister for Budget and Planing from Oyo state.

To his chagrin and disappointment, president Tinubu settled for Bayo Adelabu and asked him to own the nomination of the former Minister for power, a request he claimed he rejected.

He therefore concluded that all the Ministers nominated from the South West are from Bourdilon.

I have carefully analyzed this confession by Governor Seyi Makinde and I have a few questions for him.

Why is it that Governor Seyi Makinde is the only one complaining about a breached agreement?

Why did it take him all these long to come out with this fact?

What was the criteria for the nomination of Bimbo Adekambi? Did he just take a random decision to choose Adekambi without a prior relationship between the two of them or what?

How does Governor Seyi Makinde want to convince any right thinking person that he believed an agreement would be binding on Tinubu on the strength of Governor Sanwo-Olu’s alleged signature?

For me, that doesn’t make any sense, most especially, for an ” accomplished Engr” like Seyi Makinde!

I am surprised that Governor Makinde leaves out what he benefited from the alignment with Tinubu in 2023.

Remove the alignment with Tinubu in 2023, Seyi Makinde was a goner and the fact that he was able to secure a second term in office ought to have been enough for him.

I am also surprised that Governor Makinde didn’t understand that he was advertising his penchant for serial betrayal and greed when he was relating the events that shaped his re-election in 2023.

It was all about him and the decisions he took, not only affected the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP alone, it also affected certain candidates of his party during the first ballot in 2023.

Now, to the issue of Local Government Autonomy.

Governor Seyi Makinde is a very funny individual. He was very clear about his position on Local Government Autonomy in 2023.

His position was that he never even believed in their existence and I was amused when the birthday boy was saying that despite his position on Local Government Autonomy in 2023, he was still able to win in 31 Local Governments, signifying the fact that the people of Oyo state believed Governor Makinde’s explanations.

I am extremely happy that Governor Seyi Makinde has not changed his opinion on how Local Governments should operate within the Federating units.

He is still stuck on the fact that the 33 Local Governments in Oyo state should be appendages to the State Government, even, in spite of the Judgment of the Supreme Court granting them full financial autonomy.

I am shocked that Governor Seyi Makinde could attempt to confuse what happened between the Lagos state Government when Tinubu was Governor of the state and the Federal Government during Obasanjo’s period, with the illegalities he has been perpetuating with the resources 33 Local Governments.

There is a clear distinction between both scenarios.

In the case of Tinubu as Governor of Lagos state, the Lagos state Government created more Local Governments and the Federal Government was of the opinion that the state Government was wrong to have done so.

As a result of this misunderstanding, the Federal Government stopped the monthly allocations for the Local Governments in Lagos state and it led to a Judicial dispute.

In the end, the Supreme Court held that the Local Governments created by the Lagos state Government were incohate, but it faulted the Federal Government for withholding the monthly allocations belonging to the Local Governments in Lagos state.

Lagos state Government thereafter recognized and administered the newly created Local Governments as Local Government Development Areas and many states have since copied the template, including Oyo state.

In the present scenario, the president, through the Attorney general of the Federation approached the Supreme Court and sought to secure full financial autonomy for the 774 Local Governments and the Supreme Court agreed to the request.

I have been asking myself, why is it that Governor Seyi Makinde is having problems with that judgement?

The monthly allocations released to the 33 Local Governments are released against their names.

Is Governor Seyi Makinde saying that it is proper for a Governor to still be the supervisor for the 33 Local Governments?

How does the judgment of the Supreme Court translate to the Federal Government trying to take control of the 774 Local Governments?

Yorubas will always say that a dog can not stand watch over two different buildings. ( Aja kii roro, ko so ojule meji po).

I was also surprised to hear Governor Seyi Makinde talking about the fact that, instead of full financial autonomy for the Local Governments, he preferred to discuss about how the Local Governments could be empowered to survive without monthly allocations from Abuja.

Haba! Governor Makinde!! Gently now.

You are depriving the Local Governments of their entitlements and you except them to thrive. How would that happen?

Why didn’t we start with the state? Can Oyo state survive without monthly allocations?

I think everyone can now see that Bimbo Adekambi as Governor, would never allow the Local Governments to breathe.

On the other hand, Senator Sarafadeen Abiodun Alli has promised to guarantee full financial autonomy for the 33 Local Governments and the implementation of the policy requires no rocket science. All it requires is the will.

There is an existing judgment of the Supreme Court which has outlined the steps to be taken by any willing state Government.

Sarafa Alli only needs to direct relevant stakeholders at the Local Governments to comply with the judgment and that is the end of the matter.

What is so difficult in that, if you are not covetous?

I might have to do this piece in series but I will like to warn the residents of the Circular Road.

You heard Governor Seyi Makinde. He is promising you nothing.

My only problem with him is his attempts to shift the blame of the chaos he orchestrated at the Circular Road on the late Governor Abiola Ajimobi.

He even said that that the Government of Ajimobi defrauded residents of the Circular Road!

Sometimes, people like Governor Seyi Makinde needs no one to enchant them. Their character is an enchantment on itself.

If you’re saying that the Governments of the late Ajimobi defrauded residents of the Circular Road, is Bimbo Adekambi not an integral part of that Government and that is before you begin to ask the Governor for proofs.

I enjoyed Governor Seyi Makinde’s valedictory Media Chat, while looking forward to the new era awaiting him next year.

My father used to tell us that the mouth of the liar does not ooze blood. ( Enu opuro kii seje).

By the way, I saw that Governor Seyi Makinde never mentioned anything about the report of the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into the abduction of Teachers and Pupils of Yawota and Esinele communities of Oriire Local Government.

How far now?

Sola Abegunde.

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Re: Adekambi vs Alli: Dr. Olanrewaju’s Descent To Soliloquizing | Sola Abegunde

Published

2 weeks ago

on

October 1, 2026

By

 

I have read Dr. Sulaimon Olanrewaju’s piece titled ” Adekambi vs Alli: Between Substance And Sensationalism” and it offers me a lot of entertainment.

Dr. Sulaimon Olanrewaju is a seasoned Journalist no doubt. Very brilliant mind, but, he needs a lecture on politics and governance.

No matter how educated or professional you could be, if you lack basic knowledge about raw politics and governance at different tiers of Government, you are bound to struggle like a fish out of the water each time you attempt to defend certain positions.

Very obviously, Dr. Olanrewaju doesn’t know how a Local Government should operate on a normal situation, even, before the Judgment of the Supreme Court obtained by president Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

I will refer Dr. Olanrewaju to a document titled ” Financial Memorandum for Local Governments”.

That document speaks to how funds belonging to the Local Governments could be legally spent.

It will also provide accurate information about the roles and powers of the Local Government Chairmen, Head of Local Government Administration, the Finance and General Purposes Committee, F&GPC, how approvals for funds, projects and how contracts are signed at the Local Government level.

Had it been that Dr. Olanrewaju had proper information, I am sure that he wouldn’t have advertised his ignorance the way he did, in the argument about Financial autonomy for Local Governments which Senator Sarafadeen Abiodun Alli is promising.

He would also have known that his Principal, Governor Seyi Makinde had been engaged in criminal activities in the manner he had been withdrawing and spending resources belonging to the 33 Local Governments illegally since 2019.

Perhaps I need to repeat this for emphasis sake. There is no Law that empowers a state Governor to withdraw money belonging to the Local Governments for the execution of projects on behalf of the Local Governments.

The fact that the monthly allocations for the 33 Local Governments would have to drop on a joint account does not confer any authority on a state Governor to illegally withdraw and spend same.

It is the responsibility of the F&GPC for each of the Local Governments to identify projects it wants to execute, approve funds for same and if the funds are beyond the approving limits of the F&GPC, it will seek approval from the Governor through the office of the Commissioner for Local Governments.

If the project would be executed as a contract, it is the sole responsibility of the HLGA to sign the contract agreement.

That is what Senator Sarafadeen Abiodun Alli is saying. That he would not make illegal withdrawals from the Local Governments funds. That he will allow the F&GPC for the 33 Local Governments to function without hinderance. That he will allow the Career officers to do their duties assigned to them by Law.

If Governor Seyi Makinde doesn’t believe in the existence of the Local Governments and he is not hiding this fact and Sarafa Alli is saying, I believe in a functional and free Local Government, where is the sensationalism in that?

Truth hurts. Dr. Olanrewaju can not, through his essay, which I consider an afterthought, rewrite the fact that, his Principal publicly declared that he doesn’t believe in the existence of the Local Governments, not to talk of allowing them to function freely.

I am surprised that Dr. Olanrewaju is of the opinion that Senator Sarafadeen Abiodun Alli is not saying what he would do differently.

I know that the Special Adviser on Media to Governor Seyi Makinde is not deaf. Neither is he blind or dumb. He is only being hypocritical.

How else does the Allied People’s Movement, APM and its Gubernatorial candidate want the All Progressives Congress, APC Gubernatorial candidate to say what he is going to do differently?

On this issue of Financial autonomy for Local Governments, Sarafadeen Alli is saying, contrary to the illegalities of the past seven years plus, he will not concern himself with the responsibilities that are ordinarily that of the Local Governments.

On Education, he has declared that he will ensure that we go back to the 30 Pupils per classroom policy of the former Governor, Senator Rasidi Adewolu Ladoja, now, H. I . M, Oba Senator Rasidi Adewolu Ladoja.

He said he will revive the Broadcasting Corporations of Oyo state, BCOS which is gasping for breath under Governor Seyi Makinde.

He was emphatic about the fact that he would set up a Committee to review the crisis created at the Circular Road by Governor Seyi Makinde within 72 hours when he is elected as the Governor of Oyo state.

He said he would review the sales and handing over of our Farm Settlements to Estate Developers amongst other promises.

On these issues, what are the clear positions taken by Adekambi?

If Dr. Olanrewaju wants us to believe his cock and bull stories about the performance of the 33 Local Governments under Seyi Makinde, I challenge him to ask his Principal to publish the statement of income and expenditures for the 33 Local Governments in the past seven years plus.

He should give us a breakdown of the total figure of the monthly allocations received on behalf of the 33 Local Governments, the breakdown of salaries and allowances paid, the number of projects executed, identities of the contractors who handled projects, the contract agreements, total figure of the Internally Generated Revenues, IGR received by the Local Governments and the VAT.

In the absence of these vital information, which I am certain they will never dare to make public, I want to humbly suggest that Dr. Olanrewaju should go and update his knowledge about how certain things are done.

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Ladoja @82: When the ladder becomes too tall and Makinde’s sin of ingratitude | By Ayinla Joseph

Published

3 weeks ago

on

September 28, 2026

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The Yoruba say, when a man forgets the ladder that took him to the top of the iroko tree, the fall that awaits him will be narrated as a proverb.

On Thursday, Ibadan stood still for its king. Oba Rashidi Adewolu Ladoja clocked 82. Not 82 years of mere age, but 82 years of bruises, battles, betrayals and benediction. A former Senator. A former Governor. An elder statesman who, like Oduduwa, returned as king. The following day, Friday, Oba Ladoja also clocked one year on the throne of his forefathers.

Ibadan celebrated him. Nigeria celebrated him. The Presidency sent greetings. Former governors knelt. Serving governors bowed. The Alaafin of Oyo paid tribute. The Soun of Ogbomoso poured libation of words. Even the Aseyin, far in Iseyin, bought a full page in a national daily to say: our father lives.

But in Agodi Government House, there was silence. Cold, deliberate, imperial silence.

Governor Seyi Makinde did not felicitate his king. No advert. No statement. No courtesy of any sort extended. Nothing. His protégé, Bimbo Adekanmbi, toed the same line of contempt. For 48 hours, Ibadan people waited for a word that never came, until shame forced a whisper.

We must ask: what manner of politics is this?

In 2019, it was this same Ladoja who held Makinde’s hand when Makinde had no hand to hold. It was Ladoja who coordinated the coalition, who gathered the angry, the broken and the hopeful, and stitched them into a garment called victory for a man who had never won anything before. Without Ladoja, there would have been no Omituntun in 2019. And the man knows it.

Philosophers call it the Paradox of Power. Machiavelli warned about it in “The Prince”: that power acquired through the mercy of others must be sustained by gratitude, otherwise it consumes itself. Plato called such rulers philosopher-kings who failed philosophy. Men who know how to win power but not how to carry it.

History is littered with them.

Emperor Nero of Rome who burnt the city that made him emperor. King Rehoboam in the Bible who told the elders who made him king: “My little finger shall be thicker than my father’s waist.” Emperor Commodus who thought Rome was his father’s farm and turned the palace into a circus until the circus swallowed him.

Seyi Makinde governs like them — as an emperor, not as an Omoluabi. A man who believes loyalty must flow upwards to him, but must never flow downwards from him. He rides on the shoulders of giants and then complains that the giants are too tall.

Today it is Ladoja he snubs. Yesterday it was the Alaafin. The day before, the Soun. Tomorrow, which Oba will taste his disdain? He has transferred his personal hatred for the Olubadan stool into a war against all royal stools in Oyo State. That is not politics. That is poison.

And what shall we say of Bimbo Adekanmbi, his political son, who has learnt this ignoble art of ingratitude so perfectly? The Yoruba say, “the child who says his mother will not sleep, he too will not sleep.” To watch a man seeking to be governor practise contempt for the throne he seeks to govern is a disaster foretold.

Oyo people know Omituntun 2.0 for what it is — a poisonous pill coated with sweet advertisement. If 2.0 can openly humiliate an 82-year-old first-class monarch who made him, what will Omituntun 3.0, headed by his anointed, do? It will be the unkindest cut of all. It will be the complete desecration of the Omoluabi ethos that Ibadan and Oyo hold sacred.

Seyi Makinde will be remembered. Not for the roads that crack before commissioning. Not for the parks that lead to nowhere. He will be remembered as the governor who rode on the backs of eminent men and made every one of them regret that they ever lent him their shoulders.

Ladoja at 82 needs no advert from Agodi to be great. The king’s greatness is not conferred by the governor. But the governor’s smallness is exposed by how he treats his king.

Oyo people, shine your eyes. This affliction must not rise a second time.

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