FAYOSE: BETWEEN RADICALISM AND THUGERISM

For sometime, I have refrained from commenting on the person and acts of Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State even though I should as a stakeholder in Ekiti's project for several reasons, of which am not willing to share in this piece.

Like him or hate him, Governor Ayodele Peter Fayose is a controversial person who will say things the way he sees it no matter whose ox is gored. Some which say, this is the character of a typical Ekiti person: saying things the way it is without fear or favour. Hence, many people are wont of labeling the people of the State as being stubborn.

Today and this piece also may not be appropriate medium to embark on this discourse too, but not many will forget that it took a man from Ekiti by name: Fabunmi of Schemes to mobilize other Ekiti sons and daughters against the injustice of the Alafin and Oyo Empire in the pre-colonial Nigeria. Otherwise, the entire Yoruba land might have continued to be subjected to inhuman treatment by the Alafin and his emissaries.

Now to the subject of my article; Governor Ayodele Fayose: A Radical or A thug? The answer lies in between. To a large extent, Fayose has remained to a large extent the voice of the opposition in recent time. He has by his vociferous comments on national issues and the PMB's government kept the ruling party on their toes, though many of his assertions are mostly extreme and unbecoming of a statesman.

One of such issues is his recent position on the Fulani herdsmen that cattle rearing in Ekiti on unapproved areas is not permitted with a promised to make law with respect to it. Maybe that would have made sense, as the death of one man is the death of all. To this extent, ― John Donne, in Meditation XVII - Meditation 17 submitted thus:

"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in humanity." 

(The modern version, the original version read thus:

“Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.”

It is however becoming unbecoming of a Governor to empower local hunters to fight against the marauding Fulani herdsmen because of their ignoble deeds, which to all intent and purpose should become issue of serious concern to the PMB's government as the continuous massacre of the innocents by these herdsmen must be promptly addressed before it becomes another national nightmares. My position on this is that two wrongs, they say, does not make a right.

The empowerment of the local hunters against the cattle Fulani herdsmen is tantamount to returning us to a state of nature during which life was 'nasty, brutish and short' borrowing the words of Thomas Hobbes. To this extent, it is condemnable and un-statesmanlike.

Unfortunately however, the commissioning of this local hunters coincide with the day Governor Akinwunmi Ambode handed over a set of security apparatus to the Nigeria Police and other security outfits; hence, there has been public outcry and condemnation against the person of Governor Ayodele Fayose.

Without defending the deed of the latter however, it is prejudicial to compare the two Governors based on their different level of resources and peculiar circumstances of the two different Governors. The fact as today is that Lagos remain perhaps remain the only viable State out of the 36 states of the Federation in term of resources. The budget of Ekiti is perhaps what Lagos make in three months from IGR. Be that as it may, Governor Fayose could have done better.