Castro, Chavez, Obasanjo, and Obama: Contrast in Leadership

By Dr Spinoza & Frances Robles | 18 Apr 2009

If leadership was about demeaning other people, creating fear, malicious obedience, and combative bellicosity; if effective leadership is about effectively silencing all dissenting opinions through murder and election-rigging, and using everyone for personal gains, and speaking with forked tongues, and exhibiting unapproachable, boring, and beastly temper, then Nigeria and the United States would be better off today because the past eight years of these behaviors and this type of leadership were over-supplied by Bush of Texas and Obasanjo of Yoruba.

But the United States has almost been reduced to ashes, and Nigeria has been inflicted with fatal wounds so great that New Orleans after Katrina is a child play in comparison.

If demons and monsters could lead without applying their true nature, the masses in Nigeria and USA would be happy today. If anarchy, tyranny, and demonic mindset and ideology could deliver peace and progress, the masses in the United States and Nigeria would be happy and fulfilled today because demonic and monstrous greed and twisted ideology were in excess supply in the past eight years in these two nations.

That America will rise again to her former glory is not in doubt. The handshake between Obama and Chavez, the body language, and the willingness of the current American leadership to care for the feelings and interests of nations, peoples, and masses are signs that America is on the way to reclaiming her former status in the world.

Can we say the same things about Nigeria? Given the empirical evidence on the ground in Nigeria and given the persistent backward mindset of the morons and children who have hijacked Nigeria, can we honestly make the claim that Nigeria will ever recover from the current Yoruba darkness and dark designs? Further, does anybody really see any sign that if all the other ethnic groups in Nigeria suddenly disappear or are completely annihilated (as planned by the Yoruba infants), that the Yoruba infants will end their childish backward mindset that has brought Nigeria to her knees? Will they begin to learn that demonic culture and murderous beasts like Olusegun Obasanjo and Adedibu and Peter Fayose and Patrice Etteh and such other demons will continue to mangle Nigeria through their a priori cultural hallucinations and falsehoods?  I doubt it! And you know it, but would not utter it. We agree in one thing - that those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad. We disagree in one thing: You know not that you are mad. I know it with certainty, and say to you here, that your inherent madness has reached a crescendo level, which is a sign that only your complete destruction by the gods or by your own mad demons will save the suffering children of Nigeria.

The conclusive proof is in the established opposition between what your side represents and what the other side exudes.

On your side are the retrogressive forces and hate-filled backward irrationalities that continue to destroy democratic ideals and lives and progress in your Yoruba communities in particular and in Nigeria in general. Bush and Obasanjo were very close in friendship, not because such friendship enhanced democracy for Yoruba people or for the masses in Nigeria, but because it provided protection and guns to be used in bringing Nigeria to her knees. Both beasts helped to contribute to the current malaise in Nigeria. While they were destroying Nigeria, your kind preached hate and destruction of Chavez and Castro because your protégés in Bush and Andrew Young hated them. You copied the same hate-filled antics of Bush and applied them to your own masses in Ekiti, Oyo, Lagos, and beyond simply because Obasanjo is your “best” in Yoruba Land. For Bush and Obasanjo, leadership was about hate and how many enemies to create and destroy so as to continue to hate and destroy. They supported each other with guns and tactics, and you supported them because you are infants with no cognitive ability to comprehend what is bad or good for you and your nation or community.

On the other side is the progressive love between Chavez and Castro. In the last eight years, Chavez and Castro were joined together by one love: hatred of President Bush. The Internet is littered with their speeches to establish this claim. On the other hand, Obasanjo and his Yoruba kind are known for one eternal modus operandi: hatred of their kind in Ekiti, Lagos, Oyo, and beyond. The former hated that which sought the destruction of their peoples. The latter aided that which would not relent in making them the laughing stock of the entire world. At the end, the results show how each side has succeeded in advancing their aims and objectives.

Chavez and Castro loved their masses and nations so much so that they looked at Bush and his policies and saw through his destructive and retrogressive mind and means. They were willing and ready to stake their lives, not because they hated their own nations and masses as you did, but because they loved their nations and were willing to challenge your powerful protégé in Bush. This was not love of self, but love of nation; and the results bear this out per your master’s vital economic and health statistics.

When a person loves or hates, it shows in his intentions, words, actions, and results. Obama is now showing the same love, not for himself or for his personal ego, but for his nation and for all peoples of other loving nations.

Obama could have copied Bush and Obasanjo as you practiced and preached; he could have emulated the current politics of Ekiti and Oyo as you currently practice and preach. He could have sent Andrew Young to Nigeria, not only to show his African solidarity with your “African best” in Obasanjo, but also to prove to the world that he looked at your hate-filled leadership style and saw a way out for his own national problems and issues. Like Bush, Obama could have exploited Obasanjo’s eagerness to sell your kind and Nigeria for personal gains and for approval and acceptance of masters and Europeans. Instead, he settled on Castro, Chavez, and love.

Many Yoruba “prophets” have spoken against this type of loving leadership because it is the opposite of what they knew and saw in the eight years of Yoruba leadership in Nigeria from 1999 to 2007. To a typical Yoruba mind, this type of love is a sign of psychological damage to Obama’s psyche because Olusegun Obasanjo and other Yoruba notables did not and do not show this type of love, and therefore, as you deduced, preach, and circulate, nothing will ever become of Obama and his love. To you and your culture, leadership and democracy are not about love, but about perpetual condemnation to perpetual anarchy, madness, and gorilla-like conflicts; love or vision got nothing to do with leadership because democratic leadership must create demonic fear, dread, anarchy, murder, and decay. The list of Yoruba sages with this type of primitive mindset is endless, from Awolowo to Adedibu, Obasanjo, Ajibola, Etteh, Yinka Akerele, and Dimeji Bankole. Hating your peers, subordinates, enemies, opponents, and those you serve is the only way your culture understands leadership and democracy and nation-building.

On the contrary, Obama considers loving both national foes and friends as the only way to look at other peoples and what he sees. This love shows in the type of leadership he is ready and willing to offer to his nation and to other peoples. He does not and will never reach out to your Yoruba sages because they got nothing to offer to America. If they did, Bush would not destroy America with Obasanjo’s friendship and wisdom at play. Therefore whatever Obama sees in Chavez and Castro is wanting in your “bests”.

He loves Chavez and Castro not because he cares about the individual antics of these people, but because through love the man sees acute visions; his eyes see talents, potentials, and opportunities to help lift up the suffering masses in USA, Cuba, and Venezuela. The inevitable loyalty, team spirit, and mutual support and benefits that will come from such an environment can never harm the masses in these nations. Unlike you and your “bests” and protégés, Obama considers the courage and commitment to love as an opportunity to help children and peoples in America, Cuba, and Venezuela. He understands that he cannot unlock the passion, potential, loyalty, and mutual support that energize and unite peoples to mutual vision and teamwork required to extricate his beloved nation from the past eight years of Yoruba-style anarchy and malaise.

It is a matter of objective and motivation. Obama targets progress for the masses in America and in other partnership nations; your only primary objective is to continue to exist in your current capacity as the only parasites of the African continent.

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Obama and Hugo Chávez shake hands at Summit
BY Frances Robles
17 April 2009

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad—President Barack Obama and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez shared a friendly handshake at the start of the Fifth Summit of the Americas Friday.

The Venezuelan government called the handshake ‘‘historic’’ and hinted that it was the first step toward thawing chilly relations between the two nations.

‘‘Before the start of the inaugural session of the Fifth Summit of the Americas, the president of the United States Barack Obama approached the president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela Hugo Chávez and offered him a greeting,’’ according to a statement released by the Venezuelan government.

“Both leaders gave their hands in a historic greeting, after several years of tensions with the Bush administration, when the relations between Washington and Caracas had deteriorated.’‘

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Who wins the Ekiti rerun election?
19 April 2009
By Adewale Adeoye, Ado-Ekiti

Oyinlola’s alleged voice ordering the 16 local governments to ‘buy guns, army and police uniforms’ for thugs has become an excruciating reference point to the PDP democratic credentials. Natives now mockingly use the recorded electronic version as ringing tones. ‘How can they bring armed men to kill us? Why this hatred for our people? Are we in a primitive society?’ Daramola said on the EKTV on Friday morning.

April 25 is at hand, a day when two key contenders for the governorship of Ekiti State are expected to file out for the race. Ekiti is a small but unique state located in the hilly heartland of the South West area. Two candidates, Dr Kayode Fayemi of the Action Congress, AC and Mr Segun Oni of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP will lace their boots this week in preparation for the race.

Though Ekiti has a population of about 2.8million people, the population has been swelled in the past weeks, with the influx of foreign and local observers. Many indigenes of the state from home and abroad have returned home. The AC already has 120 lawyers to nip possible arrest of their supporters. For the first time in recent history, all the about 52 hotels in the state have been booked largely by the over 2000 monitors already moving into the state. ‘We couldn’t get hotel. All booked’, a monitor from the United Kingdom told The Nation Friday night. Citizenship journalism has come to Ekiti. Sources say locals are procuring, in large numbers, cell phones with high capacity to capture the election and possible rigging attempts, even from distance.

‘This time, we will take the pictures and record the films of all election riggers and send them to the local and international community’ says one teacher at Iyemero, a community of less than 1000 people.

On the streets, in the deep recesses of the thickly forested Ekiti land, the heat could be felt. The tension is not so thick, for one to imagine cutting it with a knife. But there is tension anyway.

Ancient communities seem to have re-enacted old practice where music remains a potent weapon of war and politics. At Iloro-Ekiti last Friday for instance, our correspondent observed a rickety cab with a microphone fixed on top of the roof, blasting folklores, laden with political lyrics that put former Governor Segun Oni right in the centre of the ring. In many of the communities, the scenario is the same.

The tracks, a mixture of jazz and highlife, was composed by Shina Peters and Adelabu from Efon Alaaye. The last is a popular musician among locals. He has an excellent command of native tongues and wits.. For sure, music has been part of Yoruba weapon of war; even in the primordial times, some say it was a cherished pastime to accompany war heroes to the battle lines with flute, harp and lire. ‘Fayemi’s the man who owns the moment; he is the fighting spirit with the invincible power to remake Ekiti and rekindle the lost being of the masses. Between guns and ideas, wisdom rules the world as against brute force. How long will the devil prowl our homeland and threaten us with scorpions to torment and humiliate us?. Anyone who steals his vote must be prepared to face the wrath of God and the people’ one of Adelabu’s lyrics says. The music could be overheard by locals in almost all the cities, parks and far away hamlets.

A counter rhythm composed by Ologundudu concentrates on attacking the personality of the former Lagos State governor, Asiwaju Ahmed Tinubu. The musician portrays former Nigerian President, Olusegun Obasanjo and Osun State governor, Olagunsoye Oyinlola as former governor Segun Oni’s heroes. It attacks Dr Fayemi saying ‘you will not win. PDP is the party of the moment.’

However, while the battle on the air continues, the ground battle seems a different ball game. ‘This contest will be won by issues, not propaganda. We raise issues, not to attack personalities, we talk about development, we talk about improving the lives of the people,’ Mr Bimbo Daramola of AC said.

At Ijero on Friday, a crowd of Oni’s supporters, like the rythmical movement of millipedes, snaked through the city, with Oni’s pictures carved in large portraits, held above their heads. Ologundudu’s music could be overheard blasting what they referred to as ‘Oni’s achievements.’

However, on the ground, a combination of campaign strategies, personalities, ability to control ancient socio-cultural formations, the underground networks and the obvious determination of the people to troop out en masse and defend their votes seem the main factors that will determine where the pendulum will swing. For instance, despite his low popularity rating, Oni still hopes for an edge in Ifaki, his hometown. 241, 769 voters are expected to participate in the 64 wards spread across ten local government areas. There are about 7098 voters in Ifaki. The votes are expected to be shared between Oni and a prominent, influential Ifaki indigene, Mr Bunmi Adetunmbi who contested for the senatorial seat in 2007.

He already won at the Tribunal against Senator Ayo Arise. ‘Everyone will like to have a governor from his own town, but in this case, I’m also a well respected indigene of my town. I have credibility and my people know what is right,’ he told The Nation. Oni seems to be banking on the areas where his regime claims to have constructed roads. The PDP candidate’s supporters also hang on the thinking that the 13 PDP members in the State House of Assembly will drum support from their constituencies.

Oni will however need to contend with the 13 AC members in the House. Some areas are critical. South West, North and Ido-Osi are important. There are 24,209 votes at stake in Ijero and 29, 801 votes expected from Ikole Ekiti.

But in recent times, a gale of cross carpeting has swept through Ekiti with the AC as the key beneficiary. Many outstanding PDP members have crossed over to the AC one of whom is Mr Akin Olayisade from Ido Osi. Recently, a former permanent secretary from Ikole decamped to the AC.

Irepodun –Ifelodun local government is crucial. Here, a combination of AC rural supporters and former governor Ayo Fayose come into reckoning. He is believed to have a measurable influence in the area. He and the AC leaders in the area have been going from house-to-house campaigning for the AC. Fayose’s constituency boasts of 38, 167 voters. Though Oni’s former Commissioners and advisers have been relieved of their posts, there is the general assumption that many of them will fight hard to defend their homesteads, if only for the need to preserve their pecks and privileges. Some of Oni’s strong supporters are former military administrators of Rivers and Bayelsa States, Ernest Adeleye from Igede and Caleb Olubolade from Ipoti. However, the military background of the two and their lack of understanding of the dynamics of local politics remain a huge minus.

The Acting Governor, Olatunji Odeyemi is from Gbonyin local government area. There is the belief by a section of Oni’s camp that Mathew Odeyemi, from Ode, will support Oni in the rerun. About 20,000 are expected from Gbonyin, where the obvious statesman, Odeyemi hails from. Will he support Oni, his party man? That seems a difficult question. Two weeks before Oni’s sack by the Court of Appeal, Oni was reported to have made moves to remove him as the speaker. The plot was aborted mainly by AC members who appear to cherish what many consider the charisma and ‘excellent morals’ of Odeyemi. In the state, there is the underground tone that if Oni wins, his next target will be to either muzzle Odeyemi, mobilise for his recall or to ensure he does not feature in the next political dispensation.

Fayemi on the other ground hopes to retain the support of 13 members of AC in the House of Assembly who are expected to mobilise their constituencies. This is expected to be probed up by six other members of the Peoples PDP who make up the G18, all rooting for Fayemi. In the recent past, realignment of interests seems to have superceded traditional party loyalty lines, which led to the emergence of the G18. Fayemi is from Ishan, 18, 294 voters are at stake in Oye local government where he comes from. Arise, the most outspoken PDP member is from the same local government with Fayemi and Mr Bimbo Daramola, a staunch AC supporter. Yinka Akerele a PDP member is from the same local government. He told The Nation in an interview at Ado that ‘the PDP is ready for the election. We are hoping for the best form of election that will transform Ekiti into greater heights.’ He however said he would prefer a ‘free and fair election devoid of violence and rigging.’ Moses Jolayemi, the spokesperson of Oni said his party ‘is sure of victory’ in the rerun arguing that Oni and the PDP are hopeful for ‘a landslide victory.’

Yet, in an enlightened society where political dynasties are of little relevant and where Adedibuism is virtually non existent, other factors will shape the rerun.. Some of these critical points will determine the side the pendulum swings: the average (wo) man on the street whose will seem cast in iron, the basic issues on the basis on which each individual campaigns and the overwhelming moral authority of the current state government regime which is dominated by the G18 of which the acting governor is a key member. From indications, there appears a growing spirit of hatred against the former governor and the PDP based on what one voter said was informed by his ‘weakness and share lack of vision.’ Most people in Ekiti are already living with the reality of Fayemi as the governor shown by the continuous reference to Segun Oni as ‘Segun Ana’ meaning ‘Segun of yesteryears or of yesterday.

Oni has been in power for two years, yet poverty, hunger and diseases continue to be on the increase. Most people in local and urban areas cannot point to anything that could be cited as his enduring legacy in all the 16 local governments. This is compounded by the internal crisis within his party. PDP in Ekiti is already factionalised along four diametrically opposed frontiers. For the past one month, the AC has launched two main campaigns, mini and mega.

This is apart from the free medical services which has covered virtually all the 64 wards in the 10 local governments. Yet, the PDP seems to be brushing aside the importance of rural and urban campaigns, fuelling the assumption that the waiting game is to ‘rig the election at all cost.’ Will the federal might play any role? Though the PDP invited President Yar Adua to Igede Ekiti recently, backed with a retinue of ministers, state governors and almost all the local government chairmen in states of the South West controlled by the PDP, the scanty crowd and the booing by locals, made the rally almost counterproductive. Yet, the statement by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr Deji Bankole has further oiled the engine of public fury against the PDP in the state. ‘Awa to lo MOPOL lojo si a o lo soja.’ We that made use of mobile police in the past elections will use soldiers this time around. Mrs Bisi Aregbe, a women leader in Ikole told The Nation that Bankole ‘treated us like savages whose votes do not count’

One major minus that cast a dark spot on the PDP is the gory leadership examples many locals draw from the PDP neighbouring states of Oyo, Ogun and Osun states where statecraft is believed to be a shipwreck. The recent espionage waged on the Osun State governor, Olagunsoye Oyinlola linking him to plans to import armed men into the state, instead of scaring the people, seems to have further emboldened their resolve to rise up to the occasion. Oyinlola’s alleged voice ordering the 16 local governments to ‘buy guns, army and police uniforms’ for thugs has become an excruciating reference point to the PDP democratic credentials. Natives now mockingly use the recorded electronic version as ringing tones. ‘How can they bring armed men to kill us? Why this hatred for our people? Are we in a primitive society?’ Daramola said on the EKTV on Friday morning.

Generally, what appears a feeling of amazement and melancholy arising from PDP’s woeful performance at the state levels in the South West and at the national level seems to be taking its toll on Ekiti rerun turf. Lots of voters seem anxious to return to the traditional voting pattern which many feel has helped regional integration and the upliftment of the people’s spirit of solidarity and common bound between the Yoruba people, of which Ekiti is one.

This is against the backdrop of what many Ekiti see as the Lagos state’s rainbow of glorious feats that even some PDP leaders seem to attest. Beyond all these is the spill over of the personal relationship between the American President, Mr Barack Obama the Ghanaian President, Prof Atta Mills and the AC candidate, Dr Fayemi. His links with the two has recently been moved from the internet domain to the streets and the deep recesses of Ekiti hamlets. For instance, this has been echoed in Adelabu’s lyrics that devoted a whole track to the Obama- Mills-Fayemi trio. Also, the imagination of many Ekiti people seems to have been fired by these far away, but intrinsically linked global events. Without doubt, many observers believe that Fayemi should win the election by a very wide margin, that is, if the lowest common factor in democracy, that is ‘one man one vote’ is applied and the prosperity of the Ekiti people is of any relevance.