By John Mayaki
After valorizing himself as the hero of the people who watched over their resources to prevent imaginary ‘godfathers’ in his state from gaining access to them, Godwin Obaseki, the embattled Governor of Edo State, has been going from state to state, shaking hands with renowned godfathers, kneeling, crying and praying for salvation at strange altars, and striking deals using the treasury of the state as bait.
Blinded by desperation and rendered unreasonable by the pull of powers and its pecuniary benefits, he has announced himself ready to make a pact with the devil, willing to bow at the feet of Baal, and if the treasury of Edo State is the price, he has also made it clear he doesn’t mind throwing it open, widening the pool of those who routinely made undeclared withdrawals that crippled development in the state under his watch.
From Abuja to Rivers, from Yenagoa to Delta, Obaseki wanders around, abandoning governance at home, searching for a new home after the All Progressives Congress rightly showed him the exit as penance for a past of forgery and perjury manifested in his academic certificates all of which are with conflict with each other and common logic. A certificate said he gained admission into the university in 1973 and spent three years, another said he gained admission in 1976 and graduated in 1979. The same man, one degree – it was PDP who first raised the alarm.
His crimes invalidated him in the APC, that party of progressives. But they apparently made him desirable in other groups and marked him out as the perfect fit.
And so, disgraced and exiled, Obaseki has crawled into a house he doesn’t even know. From criticizing and recklessly abusing the powers of his office to block the return of Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu into a party he helped build from the ground, Obaseki has now been reduced to a disgraced interloper, seeking shelter in a party he knows nothing about.
The unraveling is complete and the hypocrisy is over. Obaseki never fought godfatherism; he merely tried to be one and failed horribly. And now, seeking an extension of his term in office against the will of the majority, he has traveled far and near, dangling the keys to the treasury of Edo State for appeal, before delivering them into the hands of new-found political overlords.