thanks prof Afolayan
please forgive my doubting this-
please forgive my doubting this-
''the Igbo's gloating over the victory of the LP in Lagos State over Tinubu's APC, claiming it was their overpowering ethnic revolution against the Yoruba that brought it to being. ''
I would be pleased to see evidence of this even though I have read it reported by two other people.
Why do I doubt it?
It could be true that a good no of LP supporters are Igbo, going by my experience on Facebook.
It seems also true that a good no of Yoruba people did not vote APC at the Presidential election.
The open critiques of BAT I witnessed from Yoruba people at the highly Yorubanized OAU campus late last year continues to shock me.
Its most unlikely that Igbo votes alone defeated APC in the Lagos Presidential or provided the majority of votes that did so.
The reasons why APC lost that election might not be hard to see, given the high youth demographic of Nigeria, the cosmopolitan nature of Lagos, the EndSars fallout and the disasters of the APC govt.
Most people I spoke to at random in Lagos were not APC. Atiku seems to have been ruled out for them. Imagine APC losing even Bourdillon, where Tinubu lives.
Its also true that anti-Igbo demonization is not new to APC politics, as in the Oba of Lagos threatening to drown Igbos in the lagoon if they did not vote for APC guber candidate Ambode in a previous election in which all parties necessarily fielded only Yoruba indigenes.
I am not aware that the Oba ever apologised nor was called to order by APC.
Apart from that incident, which I followed, it is also claimed that anti-Igbo demonizations are invoked at every election cycle. APC thugs disrupting voting in Igbo dominated areas was reported through video evidence I saw in 2019.
I am opposed to APC and PDP. I see Obi as a political opportunist like most of the others. The controversially named Obidient movement, however, is a movement coalescing around the idea of an alternative to the old boy politics of APC and PDP, with Obi, ironically a man in his early 60s, and a defector from PDP, as its centre.
I hope they can regroup, using another name, genuinely youthful political contenders, eliminate dogmatism and close mindedness to alternative views, and continue the long struggle to change Nigeria's political and economic eco-system.
The visionary, welfarist and techno-savvy culture that defined the Lekki toll gate arm of the EndSars movement convinced me that those are the kinds of people to be running Nigeria, not the Tinubus, the Buharis, the Atikus or even the Obis.
We need a new generation of politicians.
Watching the stepping down of most APC contenders for Tinubu at the APC primaries was a sad experience for me, encapsulated by former lawmaker Dimeji Bankole giving as his reason for stepping down ''emi no fe dagba'', ''i too want to grow into being an elder,'' complemented by Ekiti state governor Fayemi giving as his own reason that he ''still has much time ahead of him'', all invocations of age and time by vigorous men in their 30--50s referencing Tinubu, an old man of troubled health who has already made a powerful name through a decades long chequered career in politics, these much younger but mature men in their prime giving way to such an elderly man who refuses to give way for his political children who are fitter than him but insists he must be king as well as king maker, while other countries reinvent or revivify themselves by changing their leadership demographics in favour of people who grew up in the relative present rather than in the past.
So, will Fayemi and Bankole expect younger people to step down for them tomorrow?
One argument is that backwardness demonstrated by classical African cultures was due significantly through an excessive focus on tradition and gerontocracy.
thanks
Why do I doubt it?
It could be true that a good no of LP supporters are Igbo, going by my experience on Facebook.
It seems also true that a good no of Yoruba people did not vote APC at the Presidential election.
The open critiques of BAT I witnessed from Yoruba people at the highly Yorubanized OAU campus late last year continues to shock me.
Its most unlikely that Igbo votes alone defeated APC in the Lagos Presidential or provided the majority of votes that did so.
The reasons why APC lost that election might not be hard to see, given the high youth demographic of Nigeria, the cosmopolitan nature of Lagos, the EndSars fallout and the disasters of the APC govt.
Most people I spoke to at random in Lagos were not APC. Atiku seems to have been ruled out for them. Imagine APC losing even Bourdillon, where Tinubu lives.
Its also true that anti-Igbo demonization is not new to APC politics, as in the Oba of Lagos threatening to drown Igbos in the lagoon if they did not vote for APC guber candidate Ambode in a previous election in which all parties necessarily fielded only Yoruba indigenes.
I am not aware that the Oba ever apologised nor was called to order by APC.
Apart from that incident, which I followed, it is also claimed that anti-Igbo demonizations are invoked at every election cycle. APC thugs disrupting voting in Igbo dominated areas was reported through video evidence I saw in 2019.
I am opposed to APC and PDP. I see Obi as a political opportunist like most of the others. The controversially named Obidient movement, however, is a movement coalescing around the idea of an alternative to the old boy politics of APC and PDP, with Obi, ironically a man in his early 60s, and a defector from PDP, as its centre.
I hope they can regroup, using another name, genuinely youthful political contenders, eliminate dogmatism and close mindedness to alternative views, and continue the long struggle to change Nigeria's political and economic eco-system.
The visionary, welfarist and techno-savvy culture that defined the Lekki toll gate arm of the EndSars movement convinced me that those are the kinds of people to be running Nigeria, not the Tinubus, the Buharis, the Atikus or even the Obis.
We need a new generation of politicians.
Watching the stepping down of most APC contenders for Tinubu at the APC primaries was a sad experience for me, encapsulated by former lawmaker Dimeji Bankole giving as his reason for stepping down ''emi no fe dagba'', ''i too want to grow into being an elder,'' complemented by Ekiti state governor Fayemi giving as his own reason that he ''still has much time ahead of him'', all invocations of age and time by vigorous men in their 30--50s referencing Tinubu, an old man of troubled health who has already made a powerful name through a decades long chequered career in politics, these much younger but mature men in their prime giving way to such an elderly man who refuses to give way for his political children who are fitter than him but insists he must be king as well as king maker, while other countries reinvent or revivify themselves by changing their leadership demographics in favour of people who grew up in the relative present rather than in the past.
So, will Fayemi and Bankole expect younger people to step down for them tomorrow?
One argument is that backwardness demonstrated by classical African cultures was due significantly through an excessive focus on tradition and gerontocracy.
thanks
toyin
thanks
thanks
toyin
On Mon, 10 Apr 2023 at 13:12, 'Michael Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> wrote:
--Yep, Oluwatoyin, I also thought it was an extreme comparison. In my mind, the two men are apples and oranges. For those of us who are fairly familiar with the two candidates, they are poles apart in their political actions, persuasions, dispositions and even intelligence.As to the apparent "rabid" ethnocentrism, the blame goes both ways. You cannot absolve either of the groups. I think it almost became Newton's third law of motion, "action and reaction are always equal and opposite." It is a well known story: The Yoruba reacted swiftly to the Igbo's gloating over the victory of the LP in Lagos State over Tinubu's APC, claiming it was their overpowering ethnic revolution against the Yoruba that brought it to being. The Yoruba then convinced and mobilized their people overwhelmingly, literally neutralizing the seemingly strong power of the LP. The Igbo, in their own case, then reacted to the Yoruba folk's unmatched reaction that drowned the LP in the gubernatorial polls. It's a simple scenario. In all, it's such a sad narrative. Any action or reaction that brings about the loss of any life is unfortunate. Sadly, lives were lost in the fracas. I hope both sides learned some lessons moving forward!MOAOn Monday, April 10, 2023 at 04:23:14 AM EDT, Oluwatoyin Adepoju <ovdepoju@gmail.com> wrote:is this not taking things too far in equating Trump and Obi?
Obi's supporters are pan-ethnic even though containing a good no of Igbos.
Could Igbos alone have given Labour the Presidential elections in the APC stronghold of Lagos?
APC and PDP are parties many people are tired of. They want something different and Obi and Labour gave it to them.
If any party is rabidly ethnocentric, its is Lagos APC, which used deadly ethnocentrism as its main tool of fighting back after losing that election, a strategy spearheaded by the vile anti-Igbo utterances of their spokesmen Bayo Ononuga and FFK, which latter I have compiled and sent to this group in response to a challenge from another forumite but which the moderator has refused to post because it foregrounds ethnocentrism without preferring solutions, he claims.
How will dangerous ethnocentrism be combated if evidence of it is not presented as some pretend it was not a central factor of APC in the Lagos guber, and has been in recurrent elections, with even the Oba of Lagos in a previous election threatening to drown Igbos in the lagoon if they did not vote for APC's Ambode?
Make we hear word, as its said in pidgin.
thankstoyin--On Sun, 9 Apr 2023 at 21:37, Mobolaji Aluko <alukome@gmail.com> wrote:STAR ESSAY: Obi - Trump of Africa--ByNiyi AkinnasoApril 5, 2023Donald J. Trump and Peter Gregory Obi. The comparisons of aspects of their political behaviour are too close to ignore. They are both supposed billionaires turned politician. They both won elections before, Trump as President of the United States and Obi as Governor of Anambra state, Nigeria. They both lost the election to be President of their respective countries. Trump lost reelection in 2020, while Obi lost in his first attempt in 2023. They both denied the election they lost and encouraged their supporters to protest the results, while they continue to attack electoral officials and to denigrate the winner of the election.The similarities in the campaigns for their failed presidential bid are worth detailed examination. To varying degrees, they both relied on ethnic and religious bigotry. True, there are no primordial ethic groups in the US as in Nigeria, but there are ethnisised populations in the country. They include Native American Indians (the original, but displaced, owners of the land), Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, and Jews. Some of these populations, especially Blacks, are racialised more than others. Opposed to these "ethnics" are Whites—nationalists and patriots in Trump's terminology. Against that terminology, Trump's campaign slogan, Make America Great Again, actually translates to Make America White Again.As for Obi and his ethnic followers, there are basically two ethnic groups in Nigeria—the Igbo and others. He took his campaign to the Igbo wherever they are located in Nigeria and even in the Diaspora. Majority of Igbo voters responded with their votes for him so much so that no other candidate had meaningful votes in the five Igbo states in the Southeast. He also mopped up Igbo votes elsewhere. IPOB and so-called Unknown Gunmen in the Southeast went into voluntary ceasefire to pave way for Obi's unrealised victory.Trump and Obi also both used religion as a campaign weapon. Trump, who rarely goes to church, would visit churches during campaign tours and boast of his popularity with "the evangelicals". His transactional use of religion could be illustrated by two separate events. On one occasion, during the riots following George Floyd's police killing, Trump stood by Saint John Episcopal Church beside the White House, with a closed Bible in his right hand, for a photo-op, while protesters were being tear-gassed in front of the White House. His attempt to further demonstrate his religiosity the following day, by posing in front of the statue of Pope John Paul II in Washington, drew even more criticisms. Politicians and even church leaders lambasted him for his transactional use of religion.Obi's transactional use of religion is much worse than Trump's. Just as he targeted Igbo populations across the country, so did he target religious leaders, moving his campaign from church to church. Sunday sermons in many churches, especially in his Southeastern base, became political sermons and tutorials on how to vote "wisely". In no time, his Labour Party logo of Papa, Mama, and Pikin was quickly reinterpreted in terms of Joseph, Mary, and Jesus. Translation: A vote for Obi is a vote for the Lord. It is no wonder then that Obi told Bishop Oyedepo in a leaked audio conversation between the two that the election "is a religious war". The Bishop responded, "I believe that, I believe that, I believe that", and assured Obi that "the result will be favourable". Obi almost offered a quid pro quo during the conversation: "Like I keep saying, if this works, you people will never regret the support".Another shared feature between Trump and Obi is the use of social media by their supporters for disinformation, misinformation, defamation, and even slander. While Trump's supporters are famous for conspiracy theories, Obi's are famous for fake news and trolls.By the time the election was held, it was clear that Trump and Obi had developed into some cultish figure for their followers. Relying on these followers, religious blessings, and inaccurate opinion poll results, both men became sow psychologically invested in the success of their campaigns that they did not even imagine that they could lose.Yet, both men lost squarely. Trump had 74.2 million popular votes, whereas Biden had 81.2 million. What is more, Trump did not meet the constitutional requirement of 270 electoral college votes to be elected President. Instead, he had only 232 electoral college votes, while Biden had 306.Obi's case is even worse. While Trump was the runner-up in the US election, Obi came third with 6.1 million votes in the Nigerian presidential election. Even the person who came second, Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, with 6.9 votes said publicly that Obi could never have won. Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress, had 8.7 million votes. Even more importantly, both Atiku and Obi fell short of the constitutional requirement of winning at least 25 percent of the votes in 24 or more states. Both Atiku (21 states) and Obi (17 states) fell short of the requirement, whereas Tinubu, who won, met the requirement in as many as 30 states.Trump's and Obi's denials of the election could only arm their supporters to spew conspiracy theories and misinformation about the election on social media and on TV as well as engage in disruptive behaviour. While Trump's supporters went as far as attacking the Capitol, which houses Congress, in order to prevent the certification of Biden's winning result, Obi's supporters are protesting all over the place and vowing to disrupt Tinubu's inauguration as Nigeria's President on May 29, 2023. Instead of inauguration, they advocate an Interim National Government, which is unknown to law.What makes the political behaviour of these two men most objectionable is that they both have availed themselves of the constitutional means of seeking redress. Trump filed over 60 lawsuits to challenge one aspect or the other of the 2020 US presidential election and lost all of them. Obi's petition is already with the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal. If he is so confident of his evidence, why not wait for the verdict?By continuing to deny the election and inciting his followers, even after filing his petition, Obi appears to be playing Trump. The last man who did that was Jair Bolsonaro, the former President of Brazil, who lost his reelection bid in 2022 to the present President, Luiz Lula da Silva.Angered by the loss, and incited by Bolsonaro's speeches, his supporters attacked the Supreme Court, the Congress, and the Presidential Palace. Like many of Trump's rioters, many of Bolsonaro's rioters are now languishing in jail. Bolsonaro earned the nickname of Trump of the Tropics. Obi may well be Trump of Africa.Aluko CommentaryThis is all Chimamanda's fault: for writing that silly hollow letter to Biden asking him to do what? Now an essay has to be written that Biden fully understands.Thanks, Prof. Akinnaso!Bolaji Aluko--------------------------------
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