Society Gists

Shortly before the elections, Dapo Abiodun boasted and kept reminding everyone that he was the Chief Security Officer of Ogun State. Only a man who is not sure of his own status will keep telling people what he is. It is an attempt to psyche himself into an office which he believes he is not eminently qualified to hold. It is a mental elixir, and he needs to keep reminding himself anout that every two hours of the day, so that he can always remain in character. The office of the Governor is like a role in a play (make believe) to him and once he steps out of character, his real personality will take over him and this will be quite antithetical to the conduct and personality that such office requires.

Few days after the election, the Governor has stepped out of role and character. The shock of losing the election was more than a role play and too complex than what he can manage. Since he doesn’t handle his social media pages and Twitter handles, new characters emerge as Dapo Abiodun’s Voice over artists. The Governor having been reduced to a puppet, some of his media aides Kayode Akinmade, Ojo Adediran etc suddenly turned to Puppeteers of their Masters, speaking for and on his behalf, and sadly embarrassingly. Incidentally, both Akinmade and Ojo have no votes in Ogun State Elections.

They went to town looking for everywhere and everyone to shift the blame on. This is understandable as an attempt to mask their incompetence and no contributions to the electoral fortunes of their Paymaster.

They couldn’t think of the depth of embarrassment such an excuse portend for a Chief Security Officer of a State. Barely three weeks before, during the Presidential and Parliamentary elections, APC and the Senatorial Candidate of APC in Ogun East, Otunba Gbenga Daniel returned 115,147 votes to emerge the winner, it should be embarrassing that three weeks after that, a whole Governor of a State returned just about 86,000 votes in the same Senatorial District, and this in spite of all rigging, sponsored violence, voters suppression, deliberate disenfranchisement of voters by the Chief Security Officer of Ogun State. It is instructive to note that Governor Dapo Abiodun is also from that same Ogun East Senatorial District; the results were even more woeful in his Remo Federal Constituency.

If I were a Strategy Manager, I would feel greatly ashamed to even admit publicly that someone betrayed me. It is a shame and a slight on the office of the governor. And if I were a Governor whose media managers made this kind of shameful information public, I will not wait 24 hours to sack them, because they have ridiculed the exalted office of the State’s Chief Executive and Security Officer. I will consider such media managers as enemies of state and security threats who should not be allowed near the seat of government.

There are some shame that should be borne privately. How do I honestly justify and I want the public to believe me, that my political fortunes and survival rests on a man who had left the Government for the past twelve years and had not held any other public office(s) in between. How do I face the citizens of Ogun State that in my four years in office as the Chief Security Officer of the state, I am unable to galvanize the trust and win the confidence of the people of Ogun state to vote for me. And I will be able to muster such irritating courage to claim I was betrayed. In a sane society, people will move for the resignation of such a Chief Security Officer; he has no business staying in that office a day longer.

How can Mr. Dapo Abiodun won with about 19,000 votes four years ago, and Governor (now Prince) Dapo Abiodun, the Chief Security Officer of Ogun State, after all security breaches using the full apparatuses of State and instruments of coercion in his capacity as well as the state resources in his care be moved to celebrating a vote margin of 13,000 plus. Should that be considered a promotion or demotion. In an era where people value their honour and prestige, the Japanese would have recommended ‘harakiri’ (honor death) for such a leader. In civilized modern democracy, such a leader would have been advised to resign honorably.

If it were in a warfare, such grave mistakes would have been declared as lack of competence and capacity on the part of the leader and the military high command would have called for a truthful Strategy review session on why, instead of passing the bulk elsewhere.

My silent verdict is that, Governor Dapo Abiodun had failed the people of Ogun State in the last four years, he has treated the people as a commodity to be bought and discarded as it pleases him, and the people rightly rewarded him with a sack letter with their fingers through the ballots. If he still has a little honour left, he should just resign now.

Steve Oliyide