TD‘Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds.’ – Albert Einstein
In the political history of every time and place, there is always the emergence of a figure who wields legitimised influence that transcends official power or might.
Such individuals, some of whom may much later get into the corridors of political power, occupy no government office, wield no military might or control, have no access to state treasury, no constitutional powers to control institutions and/or machinery of state, no power to distribute ministerial posts or other juicy appointments.
They have no powers to ‘do and undo’, yet they wield a lot of influence and remain central to national discourse.
Mahatma Gandhi of India and Martin Luther King Jr of the United States of America typified the above description.
Gandhi, a lawyer and nationalist leader, never occupied any political power even when he was among top anti-colonial activists, alongside Jawaharlal Nehru – who eventually became the first Prime Minister of India at independence on 15 August 1947, Subhas Chandra and others, who led India’s struggle for independence from British rule, but was so influential and epitomised the age-long dictum that relevance is not conferred by office; it is earned by influence.
Martin Luther King Jr, on the other hand, was a civil rights activist, a preacher of the gospel and leader of the anti segregation and discrimination movement in the United States.
It would only be imagined how a black American at the peak of his era, 1955 – 1968, could inspire millions of Americans, via mere speeches, to “rise” above racial sentiments and live out the true meaning of their Creed, the American Creed.
Read his homilies, _”The American Dream, The Three Dimensions of a Complete Life”,_ and _”A Knock at Midnight”_ again.
They still resonate. Power of Legitimised Influence!
Back in Africa, several figures have exercised enormous moral, cultural, religious, or revolutionary influence over their people without necessarily holding formal governmental power at the time of their greatest influence.
Nelson Mandela (1918 – 2013) of South Africa and Thomas Sankara (1949 – 1987) of Burkina Faso, though dead, but are still very much remembered and revered for the influence they exuded on their people.
In the pre-colonial and colonial Nigeria, moral and cultural influences subsisted.
Do not take my words for it, the colonial masters would not have recorded complete success adopting the Indirect Rule system in the administration of the pre-independent Northern region all on their own.
The enormous influences at the disposal of some of the cultural and religious leaders moistened the grounds and provided the initial filip for the adoption of the indirect rule, wherein the citizens obey their influential leaders, who, unbeknownst to them, the citizens, were simply acting the scripts of the White men.
Some African proverbs would have it that a tree is known by its fruit, and that the lion does not need to announce its presence.
There are still people who wield and exercise influences in Nigeria, but in contemporary Nigerian politics, few personalities, if any, fit the above descriptions more than Mr Peter Obi.
Apparently, Obi would appear second to none, comparatively. Most Nigerians, especially the youth, see him as their political party, the only hope for a better Nigeria.
They say that they are running to be the Nigerian president through him.
They see him as the constant factor, thus they follow him to whichever platform he deems fit to flag off and achieve “their” presidential ambition.
And that is the problem.
After what was presented as Obi’s scores of the 2023 general presidential election by a certain Mahmood Yakubu-led Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC): a man without structure and whose supporters are according to Adams Oshiomole, ‘just four people twitting from a room’, amassing over six millions votes; the government of the day seems hellbent to prevent him from being on the ballot, going in 2027 presidential election.
Thus, the premeditated legal bumpy roads that made defections inevitable for the man we call PO for short.
And he tactfully and peacefully did, pitching his presidential-bid tent solidly with the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), alongside another heavily influential figure and ally, HE Engr Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso.
What is next? Restlessness from both state and non-state actors! From presidential aides to other government officials, from ruling party loyalists to old order political commentators, from paid social media critics to political sycophants, discussions about Obi’s defection continue to dominate political conversations across our dear country’s political space.
Even from those that prided and bragged that his exit remains inconsequential… same story: peddling all sorts of infantile lies just to demarket the elephant in the room who always steals the spotlight like a piece of cake.
When those who claim that a man is irrelevant but will never stop talking about him, they unarguably reveal the truth themselves.
This is exactly the case of Mr Peter Obi and his detractors. Power is obviously not always held; sometimes it is felt.
This exemplifies the influence of PO and the organic support that he enjoys from the Obidients/Nigerians.
And when we lace it with the sweet alliance from the Kwankwasiyya group of HE Rabiu Kwankwaso, Nigeria is just OK!
Finally, let the supporters of the incumbent, President Tinubu, HE Atiku Abubakar and the rest focus on marketing their principals, not demarketing a man who is busy telling Nigerians how he will move Nigeria from consumption to production, how he will revamp agriculture for massive food production, taking advantage of the vast arable lands in the North, how he will pull people out of poverty and reduce or avert criminality.
Let them tell Nigerians what their candidates have in stock for us and stop wasting our time in pettiness, showing puerile and nauseating signs of logorrhoea and emptiness.
Let’s be serious!
Still, a new Nigeria is POssible!
Henry writes for PO Express Media (POEM).
(No propaganda! No slander! Just facts! Stay with truth.)
