By Sunday Olugbenga Abire
The constant rift among vehicles owners and cyclists will not abate anytime soon. It is one borne out of chronic rivalry. While it’s convenient for okada riders to meander easily, vehicle owners are constrained especially during gridlock. For the okada riders, rules are suspended.
Right is wrong and wrong is right. If you have traveled on our roads in Nigeria, you must have yelled at the impatience of these riders. And whenever the worst happens, you will see them gather to shout victimization. No matter the wrong, it’s always the vehicle owners that take responsibility. After all, it takes a rich man to own a car and the Okada rider is seen as a pauper who should be pitied.
Men and brethren, it seems the latest way to renew the licenses of failed activism in Ondo state is to openly and mendaciously berate public office holders. As in the case of okada riders, it doesn’t matter the level of insanity expressed via words or writings. Just a solid baptism from the goblet of brewed ‘ogogoro’ and you are fine with a target in government. It will pay higher if you rail the Governor of Ondo State into the jejune narrative that could even disturb public peace.
One thing has been quite common. These comrades rely on their fundamental right without recourse to truth and even the right of others to challenge inanities. Nobody, even the supposed discerning minds, would see anything wrong. What many see when they are called to answer for their crafted hatred is one sided victimization from the top.
How could these things be? That a people would forget that everyone is responsible for whatever he says or does in a democracy? That we hold it dearly to ourselves to profit from whatever ‘truth’ we uphold in the public sphere? That the Governor of a state is protected against the spread of hatred capable of clogging him as a free citizen? How did we forget these beautiful things that democracy has taught us? What’s right without obligation?
Democracy allows for the rights of the leaders and the led accordingly. If it suits the goose, it should be fine for the gander. There is no where in the world where democracy uplifts one and puts down another. I challenge our old comrades to show me one.
Regrettably, a cursory look at the antecedents of our old comrades will shock anyone. Were these not the same set of people who freely supported the worst of reforms? What are their contributions to the development of their immediate communities let alone the state at large?
Brigands who failed in almost everything are gathering to set a tune of discord. Methinks it’s the right thing to separate patriots from despoilers who thrive in lies, character assassination and tomfoolery in the name of sounding vogue like true activists.
Instructively, old comrades who are sick to answer questions shouldn’t speak or write about what they do not know. It is the greatest honour for any comrade to cherish the truth he or she feeds the public and allow such truth to go under the test of any known law without unnecessary noise.
After all, the law doesn’t victimize but corrects all wrongs. Why should our old comrades fear the laws they once loved? We are mindful of this Okada mentality. Democracy only wants the truth. Our comrades should allow the truth prevail. They are suffocating the truth that public office holders are meant to protect.
*Sunday Olugbenga Abire is Special Assistant on New Media to the Governor of Ondo State.