TRUE, he was my kinsman, but I brought out the knives and tore apart his policies, actions and inactions every time he goofed. I didn’t spare him because he was my blood, but simultaneously, I didn’t sit on my high horse and condemn him either… I simply lauded what demanded applause, but stringently also, I castigated and reprimanded others that fell short of expectation. How tall were my hopes of his administration? The Himalayas would not come close in comparison. However, the dreaded ‘but’, that dashes the expectation of the righteous, came in the way. As his final days on the highest pedestal of power as the nation’s number one man approached, the country fell into deeper anarchy- fuel became gold, rare and expensive, electricity, from its usual epileptic attacks fell into a certified state of comatose. Market prices went over the roof and our naira, shrunk horrifyingly in the face of the dollar like Jack, before the legendary giant in the myth of Jack and the bean stalk. Not to mention the continuous ravaging of the North East by sardonic devils at night and day. Concurrently, I started almost every column I wrote in those times wailing. On some days, I sobbed like a forsaken koala in the heart of the eucalyptus forest abandoned by its mother; and on other days, I shrieked in agony like the orangutan (bush baby) in the belly of an evil forest. My lungs went dry, my throat got sore and my voice broke like cracked mud. But another voice, whose shouting equaled, but surprisingly, superseded mine, was that of the erstwhile opposition- APC. While I shouted for the deliverance of the Nigerian people, they screamed “give us the baton of leadership”. While I screamed and pleaded with divinity for mercy on a nation perturbed with innumerable woes whose citizens were continuously assailed by wraiths, they insisted on taking over the reins and the whip, so they could push the derailed horse back on track. So, when Muhammadu Buhari clinched victory in the presidential elections earlier this year, I took away my sack clothes, gathered the ashes into an urn and by default, the fountain of my tears dried up. I thought that Veracity’s wailing days were over. I imagined that Veracity’s mourning and that of over 185,000,000 other Nigerians scattered all over the four cardinals of the nation had come to an end. Alas, the chorus of our collective wails was only getting modulated to achieve a higher pitch! Before the victory, the opposition pointed tainted fingers at GEJ’s administration. Earlier this year, even the most mundane occurrences, devoid of any national significance, were blamed on GEJ’s administration. In fact, if the cock refused to crow in the South West or the goat defaulted to bleat in the South East, it naturally became GEJ’S fault. So, we gave them the opportunity they so craved. We gave them the baton they vigorously clamoured for and we let them sit on the stool their backsides itched uncontrollably for, but where has that got us as nation? Our woes did not magically disappear with a wave of PMB’s magic wand. In reality, we are plunging into murkier waters and doom sits at the corridor of the nation, legs crossed, humming a melody, waiting to engulf Africa’s giant. Is this the change countrymen were willing to shed their blood for? N150 fuel pump price in the South West and higher variants in other zones with queues that mirror the waiting line on the pathway to Hades’ abode, dry and empty filling stations, shameless disowning of national promises, irked investors pulling away from the country, continuous plummeting of the strength of the naira, plunging benchmark stock index that was described as the third worst global performance and the icing on the top of the poisonous cake- policy inertia. Could PMB’s ship be stuck in the middle of the Red Sea? There seems to be no strategic presidential plan to take the people through a dry path and this could be consequent of a colossal national disaster as it appears we are tottering at the edge of an Armageddon, but ‘Baba go slow’ has not decrypted the engravings on the wall. Sadly, neither have the self acclaimed clairvoyants he surrounds himself with. The winds are whispering carelessly of sedition in the East. Young minds who feel impoverished are mapping out their plans to exhume a body that was buried remotely in the days of their ancestors, but can we fault them? Isn’t an idle man the object of the craftsmanship of Hades himself? Perhaps if a good percentage of those Eastern youths were gainfully employed, enjoying the bliss of a fulfilling career, they may not have allowed to linger for a second the thought of soiling their innocent hands by meddling with something the elders had long buried. Those ghosts, when resurrected, will chronicle untold hardship, but do the children have a scintilla of clue? I wouldn’t digress into that today, for it remains topic for another day. What we should ask this administration, whose armada docked at the nation’s shore of power several months ago, is this - was there ever a foolproof strategy in place to lead this nation from its place of gargantuan throes to the still waters of sanity? Was the change we all chanted just another inconsequential mantra? PMB assured us that Boko Haram would be ‘yesterday’ by the end of 2015…. Count down, but we have more raids, more suicide bombings and more griefs. Is this administration really capable of taking us to the Promised Land? How on God’s green earth are we expected to felicitate and sing Feliz Navidad in a few days if fuel pump price remains ridiculously high and ultimately will have an inflationary effect on the price of chicken, Christmas clothes and soft drinks? I desperately hope that our national plights and decisions taken will not, at the end, mirror that of the mythical man whose first wife was never good enough for him and hence, married another. We all must remember that the naggings and rantings of the second drove him back to the first! These are troubled times and things are falling apart. Masters’ degree holders are on jobs that pay stipends, the nation’s education standard decomposes, its fat maggots — unemployment and underemployment — have gained the status of normalcy. The song writer sang ‘Which way Nigeria?’ but I will rather end this column by asking this question, which way PMB?

Sai baba...change has come take it the way it is.Baba go carry niigerians eye see 99,nah only 1 wey nah God go rescue us.gbam!