allAfrica.com: Nigeria: Am I Really So Blinded By Obasanjo? (Page 1 of 2)

In his column on the back page of the Daily Trust, Friday, May 2, 2008, a day after my birthday, Malam Adamu Adamu, my close friend and elder brother, insinuated that I, at a point in the last eight years, "became blinded by Obasanjo to the exclusion of other issues".

Of course, Malam Adamu did not say or mean that disagreeably, but from the way some charlatans have decided to quote him out of context gleefully, anyone who had not read his original article would think differently.

My column today is not a response to Adamu Adamu's characterisation. Far from it. What he said was his personal view and I know he meant every bit of it from the tabernacle of his heart. Malam Adamu is decidedly clearheaded but sometimes too simple for a complex milieu like Nigeria. He and I discourse on issues a lot and I can't remember anytime we disagreed on any matter. I respect his intellectual equipment and I know exactly what he thinks of me.

My problem, however, is with paid writers who think they have spotted an aperture in the respected writer's column of May 2, against their bete noire (me) and they want to take full advantage of it. I hate to break this to them but I am aware that Governor Danjuma Goje of Gombe State has been throwing money around media houses and hungry columnists (some of them experienced journalists, unfortunately) to run down LEADERSHIP Newspapers Group and my person. Goje's beef about LEADERSHIP is borne out of the fact that the newspaper has taken a stand against some of his embarrassing excesses which include but not limited to his state sponsorship of terrorism, in his own Yankalare brand, and his shameless audacity of paying himself pension and gratuity of N200 million while still serving as a governor, at a time many other pensioners in Gombe State who had toiled for the state are dying of neglect. And this is a man who, many believe, did not win the elections. We have facts to prove that Goje didn't win the two governorship elections he contested for. In 2003, Vice President Atiku Abubakar rigged for him, and when Atiku fell out of favour he (Goje) jumped ship and betrayed him quick enough for Obasanjo to adopt him as his boy and in turn rig for him again in 2007. Of course, the Yankalare terrorists were on hand to smoothen the path for the governor.

And even when we acknowledged that in terms of performance as a governor (in the construction of physical infrastructure), Goje had done very well and stood in the league of governors Ali Modu Sheriff, Ahmed Makarfi, Ahmed Mu'azu, Muhammadu Aliero, Donald Duke, Attahiru Bafarawa and a few others, he still thought "[LEADERSHIP] hated him with a pathological hatred" as he told Daily Trust recently in an interview. The point Goje and his minions (especially those who feed from him) can't see is that you cannot construct all the good roads, mass housing schemes and a respectable water supply system and then unleash terrorism on the same people who are supposed to be enjoying those things, and expect them to applaud you. If you kill everyone who opposes you, of what use are your roads? In Gombe, it is capital punishment to even start wishing to become a governor.

There was a time LEADERSHIP was inundated with complaints and petitions from the Gombe public to pay more attention to what was happening in their state. On the few occasions I met with the governor, especially during his first term, I gave him an idea of what people where saying about him. I told him he was doing well as a governor in terms of physical development, but all that would come to nought if there was no peace. In a manner characteristic of people too far gone, Goje dismissed them as the rantings of his enemies.

Then one day, early last year, Dr Suleiman Kumo, a man I respected a great deal and lost last week, called me to complain that Goje had "suborned" some of my staff members and they were refusing to accept articles and even adverts not favourable to Goje. I told him that was not possible because adverts are the oxygen that keep any newspaper going. But Kumo was more prepared than me. The deceased lawyer and respected intellectual told me in his trademark wittiness that, as we spoke, some boys from Gombe were trying to convince our people to accept a three-page advert and they (the boys from Gombe) were obviously not succeeding. I thought it should be the other way round. It is my boys that should be convincing them to give the adverts. I then made a few calls to confirm what Dr Kumo had just told me. I asked if the adverts were libellous. They were not, I was told. So what is the problem? I wanted to know. My normally hardworking and competent marketing workers didn't have a ready answer. But they said they were being pressured by Goje's men, whatever that meant. My boys were eager to meet their targets, and Goje's men had agreed to help them do so. At a cost of course, if you know what I mean.

I now ordered that the adverts must be published the following day. I then switched off my phone because I knew Goje would be calling me as soon as I had given that instruction. Apparently, as Dr Kumo would incontrovertibly prove to me some days later, Goje had succeeded in bribing most other newspapers and LEADERSHIP was their last stop. That was why, in the end, despite their best efforts, the adverts appeared only in LEADERSHIP even though it was meant to appear in as many newspapers as possible.

So it should not be difficult to see why, to Gov. Goje, Sam Nda-Isaiah and LEADERSHIP are the worst things to happen to his life. But we have no apologies. Unfortunately, Goje will not keep his nose out of trouble. He does what other public officers do behind closed doors, covering their tracks carefully, openly and with annoying impunity. When he became a governor in 2003, he paid himself house rent of about N100 million, and, a few days ago, he shamelessly paid himself pension of N200 million. Goje doesn't even think this is an insult on our collective sensibility.

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