By Nwobodo Chidiebere
“It is well known that in political war, the first casualty is the truth — that during any war, truth is forsaken for propaganda.” — Harry Browne When the news of Senate President Bukola Saraki’s summon by the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) first hit the airwaves, many unsuspecting and gullible Nigerians celebrated it as strident anti-corruption war. Yet some discerning minds saw it as a witchhunt given the Senate President’s well- known disagreement with his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) over the office he occupies and the constitution of the Majority Principal Officers of the Senate. While the party gave a long list of Senators that must be named the Principal Officers of the majority party in the Senate, Saraki chose to go along with the tradition where the party only zones offices to geopolitical zones, but allow Senators and Reps from those zones to elect their preferred candidate. The preponderant opinion today, therefore, is that Saraki became the ‘most corrupt Nigerian ever’ the day he went against the whims of a club of overbearing club leaders who felt that Nigeria belongs to them. The Presidency’s denial through Garba Shehu has failed to impress Nigerians because this is a typical case of the witch crying at night and the child found dead in the morning. For instance, the President has not met with the Saraki-led Senate leadership months after their election. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is also after Mrs. Toyin Saraki and another head of one of the Sarakis’ business concerns. As Nigerians were still pondering over the persecution of Senator Saraki by those who are bent on annexing the National Assembly to enlarge their political empires from Lagos and Kaduna to Abuja, entered the APC State Publicity Secretary in Lagos, Joe Igbokwe, into the fray with a piece “No tears for Saraki”, which was larvishly used in the Vanguard newspaper. Although his obvious mission was to protect his political benefactors in Lagos, he inadvertently exposed the hypocrisy of the so-called ongoing anti-graft. Igbokwe is the Spokesperson of Lagos State Chapter of the APC, a principal partner in the already ill-fated Saraki-must-go campaign. Yet Igbokwe did not find it necessary to comment on those benefiting from IGR in Lagos. But even more important, Joe Igbokwe confirmed the widely held witch-hunt theory in the Saraki saga. Igbokwe wrote in his venom- filled, hate-driven, gutter language piece: “APC does not want Bukola Saraki as the Senate President and neither does APC want Ekweremadu as the Deputy Senate President. Saraki has caused enough implosions within the party…. He has slowed down the party’s machinery from taking off smoothly, and he has portrayed us as a weak party. Now is the time for him to go. Saraki has no choice than to go otherwise he will have himself to blame. Again if Bukola Saraki feels his hands are tightly glued to the exalted seat of the Senate Presidency and therefore cannot be removed, APC may be compelled to tear or cut his hands off, so that the National Assembly can move forward.” Hmmm! What other evidence do we need? This fully confirms Saraki’s remarks in the witness box that his party docked him because he became Senate President against their wish, but in line with the wish of overwhelming majority of the Senators who elected him. Igbokwe also wrote: “Saraki and his gang of forty thieves devastated the master plan of our great party to choose the right people to serve as the Principal Officers in the National Assembly.” Could this man tell us how a political party with a slim majority in the Senate can impose its so- called ‘Master Plan’ on the National Assembly that comprise of Senators elected from other parties? Does this Igbokwe and his paymasters know the difference between a National Assembly of Nigeria and National Assembly of APC? How much of the APC so-called ‘Master Plan’ went into the lopsided appointments by Buhari into key offices? In continuation of his vituperation and exposure of his chronic ignorance of the law, he said: “What Senator Saraki did is unheard of in the history of party politics. Saraki made the world to believe that APC leaders are unprepared for the task of governing this country. Saraki’s inordinate ambition at once put a question mark on the capacity of leaders of APC to drive leadership in Nigeria. Saraki tried to prove to the whole world that he is smarter than all the leaders of APC put together. Saraki ignored 51 APC Senators who were in a meeting and went to do business with 49 PDP Senators, a party APC just defeated after sixteen years bloody struggle. Senator Saraki bribed his way to the Clerk of the Senate and cajoled him to proclaim a Senate that is incomplete. Saraki and Ekweremmadu criminally changed the Senate rules in order to carry out the open robbery we saw in the hallowed Chamber of the Senate of Federal Republic of Nigeria.” By the above contradictions, one is led to conclude that hypocritical Joe Igbokwe assumed that majority of Nigerians are as gullible as his fellow one-man slaves in Lagos. When the Action Congress of Nigeria, Joe Igbokwe’s inner family of the APC extended family connived with the former Speaker Aminu Tambuwal and Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila to work against the interest and directive of the PDP to enthrone Tambuwal as Speaker in 2011, the vuvuzelic Joe Igbokwe hailed it as democracy in action. The APC was also not only the brain behind Hon. Tambuwal’s eventual defection to the APC along with PDP’s Speakership mandate, but they also celebrated and praised the move to the high heavens. The National Publicity Secretary of the APC, befittingly named Lai Mohammed said: “I must say that this historic development means that our democracy is growing by the day and it is dynamic. On a more serious note, we welcome the defection of Tambuwal to APC. With this defection, APC has now taken the leadership of one arm of the national legislature. We think that having the head of the legislature from the opposition party makes for a balanced setting in government and it’s good for democracy…. Those who are saying this has not happened before and that Tambuwal should step aside as Speaker do not have the backing of history and the constitution.” The former Minority Leader, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila who is Igbokwe’s co-wailer today affirmed: “We welcome and applaud the Speaker’s decision… We are proud to acknowledge that the Speaker remains not only a member of the House of Representatives but also its Speaker. This position is consistent with the law and practice in a presidential system of government and Nigeria is no different. For the avoidance of doubt, the constitution requires only that the Speaker or Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives shall be elected by members of that House from among themselves. As a caucus, we pledge our continued support to the current leadership of the House of Representatives.” The then presidential aspirant, Mohammadu Buhari told APC Special Convention in Abuja: “We will like to thank Alhaji Aminu Tambuwal for what he did yesterday. We were overwhelmed. Taking such a remarkable risk and sending everybody on holidays till December is an achievement.” Today, as law of Karma and Section 50 of our Constitution may have it, the same Hon. Tambuwal that benefited from gang-up of then ACN, CPC, and ANPP worked with other pro- legislative independence lawmakers from both the APC and PDP to thwart the plot external puppeteers to pocket the National Assembly leadership through the imposition of puppets. What happened in the National Assembly is assertion of legislative independence. It was also politics of interest, not treachery or betrayal as the some APC power mongers and Igbokwe are trying to make Nigerians believe in the case of Saraki. And if it was betrayal, does the scripture not say that the measure a man gives is the measure he will receive? Thus, the foul-cry of APC and Igbokwe is the height of hypocrisy, especially when the same APC maneuverers ensured that APC lawmakers became Speakers of Benue and Plateau States Assemblies last June even when the PDP had the majority. I am also ashamed on Igbokwe’s behalf that he still has the face to argue that adult National Assembly members-elect who disregarded a Proclamation made by Buhari in accordance with Section 64(3) of the 1999 Constitution, clearly stating the time and venue for the inauguration of the 8th National Assembly were the democrats, while the Clerk to the National Assembly and the rest of the lawmakers who obeyed the Constitution were the anti- democrats, villains, and bribe-givers and takers. What a shame! The truth and immorality behind Saraki’s travails is clear and cannot be buried by paid propagandists. Those still in doubt as to whether he is being victimised for upholding the independence of the legislature would soon find out to their horror that Nigeria has become Africa’s North Korea.
Nwobodo, a political Analyst wrote in from Abuja.
http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/10/joe-igbokwes-ramblings-vindicate-saraki/

Well said. The unfortunate thing about this is that some moronic APC supporters would not look at this piece objectively and see the truth in this,but would be so quick to type "wailing wailers" like a bunch of malfunctioning programmed robots without a mind of their own.

Classic!