Last Saturday, I was at my mechanic’s workshop to change my car’s timing belt and the brake pads. Oh my God! Please, hold your stones! Did I say change when I meant to say replace? As I wrote last week on this space, change is now an accursed word as decreed by Empress Patience.
But the good news is that at long, long last, I have found a replacement for the word change. Instead of asking for change in any monetary transactions especially between now and April 11 when the polls will be over and done with for fear of being stoned to death, you should demand for balance.
The workshop is just a shouting distance from my residence in Kubwa, Abuja. Usually, I would drive the car to his workshop and then leg it back home to await his call when he is done with the repairs.
But as I was inching away from the car, my ears caught a conversation among a group of people who had gathered at one corner of the workshop. As I later found out, the conversationists were customers who brought their cars for repairs and spare parts sellers.
I froze on my tracks and slowly retraced my steps. Then I leaned against an abandoned car. When my mechanic asked me whether I had decided to hang around while he carried out the repairs instead of the usual practice of going home until he was done, I told him I was interested in the jaw-jaw that was going on in the talk shop.
Some mechanics occasionally lent their voices to the discussion without necessarily abandoning their duty posts. Interestingly, the gathering cut across ethnic and religious divides. To start with, they carpeted Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. They blamed the Baba Otta for all the problems bedeviling Nigeria today.
Hear one of them: “If Baba had not imposed his will on us, perhaps we would not have found ourselves in this deep mess.”
But one of the discussants cut in, swinging his right index finger: “Actually, Baba meant well. The late president, Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, would have been one of the best leaders to rule this country. However, Nigeria is jinxed in that aspect.
Murtala Mohammed meant well. He was the kind of leader Nigeria needed but they killed him before he could even settled down. Then came Gen. Muhammadu Buhari administration that claimed to be an offshoot of Murtala/Obasanjo regime.
They crushed the regime in less than two years. Yar’Adua suffered the same fate after barely two years in office as a civilian president. The man was an honest man who had nothing to hide. Remember that he declared his assets as soon as he became president whereas, his vice president, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, hid his own away from us.”
Another contributor chipped in: “Baba has since realised his mistakes and he is trying to correct them. That was the reason why he abandoned the umbrella and tore his PDP membership card openly. You see, Jonathan is like a river and Baba is the source. A river that despises its source will dry up eventually.”
“As for me, I am very worried about the way the politicians are going about their campaigns. They are just heating the polity and setting one section of the country against another. Femi Fani-Kayode and Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti are the fanners of the ember of disunity. It is like they don’t care if this country goes up in flames. Look at Fayose who went to the extent of exposing his 71-year-old mother’s behind just to ridicule a 72-year-old Buhari,” said another contributor to the conversation.
“Gentlemen, Nigeria is finished o! My boss told me the other day that by the time the general elections are over, Nigeria will be reduced to a pauper nation. The politicians have stolen everything steal-able. Our external reserves have been cleaned up.
Nigeria has become a metaphor for corruption. If Jonathan returns to power, the Nigerian masses will suffer untold hardship and he would not give a damn. After all, he would not need their votes anymore. Unemployment situation will worsen, the so-called fuel subsidy will vanish, electricity tariff will soar and poverty will play optical tricks on an average Nigerian who will see bread labels as money and rush for them,” another contributor who is a banker with a new generation bank chipped in.
Another participant asked: “What is this hullaballoo about a phone conversation between our president and the Moroccan king? Is this a kind of name dropping intended to catch Muslims’ votes?”
“I think our president is desperate to win the support of the Muslim northerners after the First Lady has touched the tiger’s tail by referring to them as producers of anyhow “shildren”. But why Morocco and not Saudi Arabia? Even if it is Saudi Arabia, will they prefer him to Buhari?” One of them volunteered an explanation.
From what I gathered, the assemblage was pro-Buhari/APC. Then one man manifested from a distance and swaggered towards the talk shop. But for the searing Abuja weather, one would have thought that he wore a sleeveless T-shirt in order to show off his muscular arms. As soon as he was sighted, one of the mechanics said
: “Aha, here comes one of Jonathan’s disciples!” I expected the newcomer to muscle down the gathering and defend his kinsman with the militancy an average Niger Deltan is known for. But to my greatest shock, he flowed along with the motley crowd.
“Jonathan…” he chipped in, “that clueless man is a disgrace to us. Anywhere a Niger Deltan is sighted now, we are looked down upon. They see us as irresponsible people whose perception of life is just to revel because we have unfettered access to free or looted money. The elite of Niger Delta are pissed off with his non-performance. He is a letdown to us.”
Then all of a sudden, I remembered that a family meeting had been scheduled for my house. As I walked away, I heard one of them shouting on top of his voices (as if to let me know since I was not part of the conversation)… ”This is our last chance to get it right or we are doomed forever!” Although the assemblage had dispersed when I went back for the car, their viewpoints hovered around the workshop like invisible clouds.
