Penultimate weekend in Ilorin, the capital of Kwara State, art mirrored life. My intervention in Kwara politics created quite a storm, and in far away Denmark, Danish author Hans Christian Anderson must have tee-heed in his grave. Hans Anderson wrote ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes’ in Denmark, but the Bukola Saraki crowd staged it as a play in Ilorin. They mimicked the Emperor’s townsmen, and it was quite an amusing spectacle.
I wrote about Saraki’s resurrection, and the crowd bayed for blood. Many went for the jugular, and across social media platforms, including WhatsApp groups, they threatened fire and brimstone. One funny character created a myth inside his own head, reeling in tales of partisan fantasy. Another came with one ghastly misadventure of a rejoinder, long on kindergarten illogic.
It was all dark comedy of dizzying absurdities.
But there were other responses, measured and mature, many of which I have received in good faith.
The Saraki crowd wondered why I had nothing “good” to write about their god in my Saturday column. They were furious. But the point about fury is that it blinds, so they missed the point. This writer wrote about Saraki’s brilliance, which he brought to bear during his guber reign in Kwara, and most notably his turbulent stint as Senate President under the disturbingly insouciant Muhammadu Buhari. Even the worst of his traducers wouldn’t disagree with this assertion.
About his flaws, I argued: “At the height of his glory, one potent weapon with which Bukola Saraki’s traducers attacked him was his widely reported “arrogance”. For many who never met him, including this essayist, it was one narrative that found legitimacy in viral pictures of aides and politicians kneeling before him in embarrassingly obsequious manners. Add that to reports of obscene malfeances and alleged corruption and you have perhaps the most potent driver of the Oto’ge revolt.
“Since he got his comeuppance at the polls in 2019, there has been a conscious attempt to redefine these things. Of course when critics invoke the spirit of Societe Generale (SGB), his admirers would point in the direction of Ilorin Airport, KWASU, Post-office overhead bridge, Shonga farms etc.
“What many, critics and admirers alike, would however agree with is that the man with boyish mien is quite brilliant. And although it’s debatable if he does allow such talents to fly without being tele-guided, his followers are often quick to point out that he is also a “builder of talents”, and in that context, they rightly point in the direction of people like the brilliant and charismatic Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi.”
So there was an allusion to a few of his laudable legacy projects in Kwara, including Shonga farm, an otherwise brilliant initiative encumbered by managerial concerns and dirty politics. I’d add here that his “Open NASS” initiative in Abuja, too, remains a fascinating part of our democratic journey—warts and all.
Yet like all humans, Oloye Saraki isn’t without his flaws, all accentuated by his visibility in politics and the corridors of power. These flaws, in a sense, were at the heart of the politics that birthed and led to the success of Oto’ge. Isn’t it then plausible that Saraki’s inadequacies would come as prologue in any account of the Oto’ge revolt, pray?
Those who make a saintly angel of the man can go worship at the temple in Ile Arugbo. They are free to serve both god and mammon, but they won’t distort history.
In Anderson’s popular fairy tale, an Emperor, full of vanity and self-centeredness, was fooled by two swindlers who made him believe in an extraordinary suit spun of gold. The imaginary suit, so claimed the swindlers, would never be seen by “fools” but the “wise and worthy”. When they checked on the phantom “suit,” the Emperor’s disciples and other jesters didn’t tell the emperor that they did not see anything because they would be labeled “fools”. And so they lied and claimed the fabric was beautiful. So did the townsmen, before whom the Emperor gallivanted, naked and empty. But there indeed was no suit; there was only thin air, some fraudsters’ gimmick, and perhaps the Emperor’s dangling phallus.
In the end, a child eventually burst Emperor’s bubble, and he was humiliated.
The Emperor in Ilorin had no suit on, at least up until March 2019, but the fawning crowd wouldn’t want the obvious stated. So from Geri-Alimi to Apata-Yakuba, he danced around half-naked, while the crowd chose to clothe him in empty lies and grand deception, riddled with ridiculous fairy tales. Like Anderson’s Emperor character, the Oloye had had his fingers burnt already, with the infamous 16-0 shellacking. One hopes that he wouldn’t fall for the same lies this second time, because his resurrection could keep those currently in power in Ilorin on their toes.
And that, for this essayist, is good for democracy.
Oloye Saraki seems to be getting his acts together, but he would need to be wary of this band of fawners, descendants of the Emperor’s townsmen.
Either ways, like in Hans Anderson’s Emperor’s case, the truth remains constant: the Oloye was naked, and perhaps still is. He needs clothes spun in uncomfortable truths.
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Oladeinde tweets via @Ola_deinde.
