It is a fight that is already in the public domain and it is so bad indeed. The good and industrious people of Kogi State will be worst off, if this “roforofo flight” continues for too long. And this is my fear for which I have spoken with a number of Kogites living outside the State.
These brothers are Alhaji Yahaya Adoza Bello (the current Executive Governor of Kogi State), who God has brought to this Olympian height is from the same Okene Local Government with me and Senator Dino Melaye who represents Kogi West (my own place of birth – Lokoja).
I respectfully call on the two gladiators to kindly bury their grievances against each other. This is not a fight for personal aggrandizement, or for self-centred superiority contest. It is a misunderstanding between two brothers (an egbon andan aburo).
In all of these, I implore these brothers to, indeed, consider, subordinate their personal interests for the larger and superior interest of the State, which is a commendable instinct from both directions.
I am particularly pained about this unnecessary dissipation of energy and resources which ought to have been converted into productive use for the benefit of the State.
I can recall that just a few months ago, before the election that brought Alhaji Yahaya Adoza Bello to power, he was a good friend of Dino. They struggled together for the actualization of Bello’s march to Lugard House on the platform of the APC.
This narrative is not about the role played by one person, or the other in achieving their respective dreams but a narrative to bring to the fore that these gentlemen have been together as brothers, collaborated with each other, and supported each other, ever before each of them occupied their present positions.
Around mid-November 2015, at the All Progressives Congress (APC), National Headquarters, on Blantyre Street, Abuja, Dino and one Senator visited the National Chairman of the APC to pledge his (or their) support for Alhaji Yahaya Bello ticket. It was on a day that some elders from Ebiraland met with Chief John Odigie Oyegun to commiserate with him and the party on the sudden demise of Prince Abubakar Audu and to pledge their support and further encourage the National Chairman to give Yahaya Bello the Party’s ticket as Governorship candidate in the inconclusive election that was scheduled to hold in the first week of December.
It was indeed later that same day, after due diligence and wider consultation that the APC National Headquarters sent Governor Yahaya Bello’s name to INEC office in Abuja and Channels TV aired it, as its major news bulletin at 10 pm. In fact, I recall, just as everyone else, that Dino was the MC during the Governor’s inauguration in January 27,2016 and one wonders when and how did the misunderstanding begin?
Governor Yahaya Bello and Senator Dino Melaye are leaders in their own rights and they certainly have followers/sympathizers across the State. The two of them have demonstrated examples of good brothers.
It is our hope that the two would not only go back to the good old day relationship and promote such robust relationship for Kogi to gain from it.
In politics, as late Chief Obafemi Awolowo said many years ago: “there are no permanent enemies but permanent interest in politics.”
Bernard Balogun (BenPino) writes from Wuse District of Abuja
0803.787.9275 and can be reached via bernardbalogun1@yahoo.com[myad]
