Amaechi: Who Knows Tomorrow?

A judicial volcano erupted last Thursday in the Supreme Court in Abuja with Celestine Omehia, the impostor Governor of Rivers State and his cult/gang-terrorised government swept aside. The Justices of the Supreme Court had supremely risen to the occasion as they did in the Andy Uba/Peter Obi celebrated tenure/vacancy case. By the time Justice Katsina-Alu read out their unanimous brief ruling (reserving the full delivery of judgement for January) Rotimi Amaechi was automatically returned to the Brick House in Port Harcourt as the bonafide Governor of oil-rich Rivers State.

“The court shall rise to do substantial justice without regards to technical justice. We cannot make orders which do not address the grievance of a party before the court. The only way to accord the appellant (Amaechi) his right which has been trampled upon is to declare that it is he and not the 2nd respondent (Omehia) who must be deemed to have won the April 14, governorship election”. What the Supreme Court was saying there unambiguously is that Omehia ‘contested’ the election on behalf of Amaechi, the rightful candidate in the eyes of the law. And he (Amaechi) was duly ‘elected’ on PDP’s platform as Executive Governor of Rivers State. The Obasanjo/Odili/Iwu ‘mago-mago’ notwithstanding.

The genesis of this whole guber thing played itself out with the Odili godfather syndrome as the chief culprit. Rotimi Amaechi went with other opponents into the PDP guber primaries and won convincingly; Omehia was nowhere to be found nor heard then. From the blues he was brought forward as ‘replacement candidate’ for a validly (s)elected candidate. A friend of mine from Ikwereland in Rivers State told me in confidence in Paris last month that Odili changed his mind on Amaechi because the latter’s wife had “gossiped” on the former’s wife. You see the power of ‘bottom power’!

The SC ruling dealt a devastating blow to godfatherism. The former Governor of Rivers State Peter Odili, a man believed in many a quarter as the most corrupt ex-Governor (even more corrupt than James Ibori, Joshua Dariye, Jolly Nyame and Lucky Igbinedion) with the tacit support of Obasanjo and the PDP ‘selected’ and ‘elected’ Celestine Omehia as ‘Governor’ for Rivers’ people. The farce that was the April 14th gubernatorial poll in Nigeria got another knock over the weekend; it was yet another deep sharp cut after Kogi and Gombe Tribunal verdicts effectively throwing government houses in those states vacant. Governors Idris and Dakingari after exhausting an option of appeal — which is bound to fail — will have to, in three months time, test their real popularity before voters.

More impostors in the states will be exposed. We are awaiting the Election Petition Tribunal verdicts on states like Ekiti, Edo, Osun, Ondo, Adamawa, Oyo etc. Prof. Osunbor in Benin city, Adebayo Alao-Akala in Ibadan, Olusegun Agagu in Akure, Olagunsoye Oyinlola in Osogbo, Murtala Nyako in Yola, Olusegun Oni in Ekiti and many more are all sitting on a stolen stool parading themselves wittingly as custodians of a stolen mandate.

Talking about EFCC, Amaechi’s purported ‘indictment’ and his Speakership of Rivers State House of Assembly for eight years the troubling question to ask is this: how can Amaechi who was a Speaker be accused and hounded of corruption whereas the ex-Governor who was directly in charge of the monthly Federal allocations running into billions of naira has no EFCC charges against him? Who is fooling whom here? How can the former Speaker had amassed wealth allegedly when the budget of the state assembly was peanut compared to the budget of running a whole state which the Governor oversaw? Or was Amaechi engaged in oil bunkering? International arms merchandise? The EFCC or SSS need to release “the damaging report” on him to the public without further delay.

In the Ifeanyi Araraume case in Imo state Obasanjo and Ali flew to Owerri to read the riot act declaring glibly that Araraume was not fit to rule Imo because “a damning security report” was against him. Was Araraume a foreign spy? A murderer? But he was a Senator of the Republic! In all these one could only infer that that was the huge price our nation paid for having a farmer sprouted out of prison spiritually, psychologically and mentally drained, to be our imposed leader; for eight years our democratic system got re-baptised to ‘Babacracy’. ‘Baba’ really went crazy!

Another point worth touching on here is the INEC/Maurice Iwu position in the guber re-runs. We feel that INEC that has Iwu as Chairman and Philip Umeadi Jnr as legal dept. head are disqualified by guilt from organising the re-runs. INEC should be re-organised immediately with Iwu thrown out as its head. We cannot afford another electoral ‘Iwuruwuru’, another electoral abracadabra similar to what we nauseatingly witnessed on April 14 and 21. I think a condemned criminal in Kirikiri Maximum Prison should be released immediately and saddled with the responsibility of organising the elections rather than the Maurice Iwu we all know as corrupt, inept and incompetent.

In Igbo language Amaechi is short form of saying Onyema-echi which literally translates in English as “Who knows tomorrow”. And Echidime means “Tomorrow is pregnant”. Amaechi, the incumbent Governor of Rivers State has, by his dogged victory at the apex court, demonstrated that nobody knows tomorrow. Not even godfather Odili or his wife Mary, a Judge at the Court of Apeal who used her influence to ‘murder’ justice there. Yes Amaechi was denied victory at the CoA but the SC has done justice.

Who knows, Andy Uba, against all rational expectations may still sing ‘Onyemaechi’ if the Supreme Court Justices by sheer abracadabra revert themselves by upholding ‘Igwebuike’ as the duly-elected Governor of Anambra State. Andy Uba’s judicial masturbation is laughable; I, for one, am bemused at its conception and its eventual outcome come November 1. But come November Uba will most definitely be humiliated and humbled once more.

Out of political activity since May 29 after serving his father in Ota for eight long years as “Special Assistant on Domestic Affairs” Andy Uba is frustrated and looking for another opportunity to continue playing god! With limitless well where he draws hefty fraudulent laundered cash with which he mesmerizes friends and foes alike Uba has proven to be a political beast out to feast on the carcas of Anambrarians. His guber ambition was hatched during his years as Obasanjo’s servant recruiting Maurice Iwu as sure-bet to Awka govt. house. But they failed to reckon with Peter — the cat with nine lives — whose incumbency still stands in the eyes of the law. Ignorant of this legal fact Uba went to towns and villages in Anambra State using money to ‘sell’ his face of a fraud.

Andy Uba deserves our collective sympathy including that of Prof. Okey Ndibe, a respected voice of reason. Uba spent heavily on both the electorates and hangers-on, the “otimkpus” and politica

l contractors who wrongly gave him the impression that victory was his. He has come back to his senses and he must have calculated his huge loss and avenues for financial recovery. With lawyers giving him positive scenarios likely to play out in the Supreme Court and those that call him ‘god’ or ‘godfather’ out in the cold in Awka and Abuja it’s not surprising why Uba has decided to approach the Supreme Court to undo what it did months back. Or are we no longer in a new season of rule of law and due process? Uba wants to ‘buy’ justice but unpurchasable justice he will get! If he succeeds by bribing his way through then we shall say goodbye to justice Nigeriana.

Who knows tomorrow? Amaechi. Tomorrow is indeed pregnant! To Chibuike (God’s power) Rotimi Amaechi one can only say congratulation. His firm belief a la Peter Obi in the judiciary to address a wrong has paid off. It takes a man of convinced principles and steadfastness to achieve what he has achieved. Thumbs up for the Supreme Court Justices.

It is democratically something to cheer about having Amaechi among the Governors East of the Niger without godfathers. Chief executives who see God as their godfather! He automatically joins Peter Obi of Anambra and Ikedi Ohakim of Imo State. (Or is Maurice Iwu Ohakim’s disguised godfather?) Welcome Rotimi to this honourable club of men of their minds. Men who take dictates from God and the electorate alone. Men desperate to be some different. Men destined to make some difference.