Loud Whispers

A Different Kind of Train Wreck in PDP

I watched Chief Bode George, the PDP elder statesman on TV the other day trying to really understand what had gone wrong with his “son.” In futility, he delved into African folklore, telling viewers that NyesomWike’s move against the PDP secretariat was like a child going after the family house after being nurtured by the same family.

You see this matter between Wike and his party PDP is something we should honestly not even be interested in if not for the fact that we are facing another kind of monster with the seeming movement of the country towards a one party state.

The PDP continues to show weakness, cowardice and “fear” when it comes to dealing with Mr. Wike. As my father used to say,  how many times will something do you before you sit up?

Anybody who sees Mr. Wike as a PDP man today is either blind or plain stupid. The man has plans and ambitions that have nothing to do with the Party and why he has not even been expelled continues to beat the imagination of Nigerians.

Me o, I see the PDP with their Bode George, their BOT, their body of governors, their NWC and their Saraki as a bunch of lily-livered people who do not have any spine. For them to continue to allow this train wreck without doing anything. Even if it is juju, it surely has come to a point where they should stand up and say, “oya come and beat all of us because we will no longer stomach all of these insults.” What rubbish.

If the only thing that the PDP will achieve in this 2027 election season is the expulsion of Wike, so be it.

I support SuleLamido who has said that he would not attend any PDP meeting until Wike has been expelled. This is the manly thing to do. Make me PDP chairman and if I don’t sack him within 24 hours, come and castrate me. Crap.  

Bimbo Ashiru: A Bolt Out of the Blue

Otunba is a gentleman o. Not prone to controversy and is very diplomatic in his utterances. But this one interview that I have just watched, it’s as if Otunba “don vex.”

The interviewer was asking him something about tax and Otunba “set” his cravat, cleared his throat and unleashed at the governors oooooo.

Aghhhhh, what are the governors doing? Why are people shouting Tinubu? What exactly are the governors doing with the increased FAAC allocation that they get? He asked with eyes daring anybody to come and beat him.

My people, I don’t know what Otunba ate that morning o or if LASTMA towed his car just before the interview because Otunba scatter ground o and much more because that position really hit the mark.

Some of us have been thinking in this direction for some time now. Apart from, maybe Lagos State, what exactly are these “people” doing apart from running around the place with sirens and disturbing the peace?

It is no wonder that Otunba ended this interview with the remark that we should consider removing the immunity so that just maybe they will sit up.

All I can say at this juncture is, I am not there oooooo. Kai, Otunba finish work on this one.

Orji Kalu: A Rainbow Collage of Irrelevance

Anytime I see or hear about this gentleman, what comes to mind are bed bugs. May heaven help you if your bed is besotted with them. They will just be biting you and you cannot see them. They remain very difficult to destroy and you will have to do a very robust fumigation to get them out of your sheets.

Na wetin this oga represent to me in this our country. Since we had the misfortune of having him in our national life, like his cousins that I just mentioned, it has been virtually impossible to get him off our national sheets.

Like a collage of rainbow colours, he will be morphing and metamorphosing into different caricatures to maintain relevance. Well, it is working for him, making him go and sew cloth with 2027 all over.

Well, pest control people are around the corner and it is just a matter of time for us to get our sheets clean and sweet again.

Speed Darlington: Outrage in the Backyard

If I say what is on my mind about this gentleman, Editor will shout again o. Me, I don’t know why Editor used to be “shaking,” “Edgar, I dey read your column six times, I will come and give two other people to read make you no go put us for trouble,” he would say to me.

But Editor, please permit me for this one. This Speed Darlington or whatever it is he calls himself is a speedy “fool.” What do you call a full-grown man who comes out on social media to say that he slept with a 15-year-old after giving her N2,000 and when the outrage was unbearable, he came out to recant and say he was doing it for content?

Who jokes about statutory rape? Who describes with such aplomb statutory rape? Does he even know the influence he carries with the zombies who follow him on the IG? Why use that kind of talk for content assuming that it is even true that it is just for content?

I think very seriously that he should be taken in and drilled because I am very sure that if we look very closely, we will see something that can get him out of circulation for a bit so that a strong example can be set. He doesn’t know what he’s doing.

Umo Eno: Enough of the Procrastination

Bro has been pre-announcing this his decamping now for months that “we don dey tire”. Mbok, if you are going, go na, so that we know how to move. You see, it is not easy like that for him because even his “mentor” Akpabio tried it and it didn’t work.

Akpabio, a far more experienced operative and far more popular politician decamped and only his village followed him, so is it this one that is still in political diapers that will easily go and expect the whole state to fall down for him.

AkwaIbom is not Delta o. Let me say that one and annoy my Delta brothers. But even at that, the movement in Delta has thrown up a lot of challenges that are giving APC sleepless nights.

See, AkwaIbom is a natural right-of-centre state. Its natural inclination is PDP and to just jump like that especially when you have run a “na me, na me” kind of government so far may just be political suicide.

The other day, a security man in my children’s school here in Lagos, called me aside and asked, “Oga this UmoEno want to finish his career oo. Do you think he is serious about decamping?” I replied, “Mbok, if he wants to go, he should go. AkwaIbom will remain and we will rebuild the state.”

So, all these “threats”, I will go ooo, I will soon go ooo, I may be going ooo, I have almost gone ooo, all these are things we don’t need. Mbok, just go. Thank you.

Olanipekun Koyede: Blame It on the ‘Rain’

To say that I do not envy this oga is an understatement. Me I sha knew that this fight against currency mutilation will always go one way for the simple reason that it is their people that are the biggest offenders.

Abi, is it the average Nigerian who can no longer drink garri that will now have naira to mutilate? See, the naira is a scarce commodity that we no longer see anyhow, so when we see it, we spend. No time to mutilate.

See all the people that have entered this trouble since the fight started – Bobrisky, Cubana Chief Priest, Okoya Boys, E-money and now the biggest fish of them all, General Tompolo. What do they all have in common? They are all either “their” people or have very strong sentimental attachment to “them”. So how will Tinubu sit down and see his “nephews,” the Okoya Boys being thrown into jail because they used naira to sing?

This Tompolo’s own even brings another dimension. Me as EFCC chairman would rather resign than enter that matter. Do you guys see the “juju” that surrounds the man? All the videos of the man that I have seen used to scare me o. Either he is walking on top of water, or he is flying on a broom. The other day, he was eating a lion with his bare teeth and used giraffe blood to soak it down. It is that one that I will now carry an ordinary pistol and red jacket and go into his forest and shout “Tinubu send me.”

Mbok, this is not Sowore o or any of those irritants who call themselves activists. This is the massive Tompolo, a man who calls himself government because he is a government to himself.

Mbok, quickly the video turns to AI, so we cannot be sure until we do forensic investigations and after that, we will call a combined team of the armed forces to discuss the possibility- please I said possibility o, not arrest o.

By the way, even if we arrest, which cell will hold a man that can change into an eagle and just fly away?

Me, I think that this one is not even a job for EFCC, it is the Commander-in-Chief himself that should lead in this mission. It is not only to be driving in a 100-car motorcade and be causing “go slow” in Lagos that is Commander-in-Chief abeg.

This is time to really show who truly is the Commander-in-Chief and supreme commander of the armed forces. Mbok, do this and see me walk naked from Shomolu to Abuja to give you flowers. Stark naked o.

EFCC chairman, mbok go and drink tea, this one pass you.

Akinwumi Adesina: A Wonderful Success?

I am sorry o, but I never really got carried away with all of that media bites. His PR team should win serious accolades with the way they sold this baba in the last 10 years.

Thankfully it has all come to an end with the expiration of his tenure at the AfDB and we will finally rest. The PR machine was second to none, no week passed without seeing the bowtie champion at one international forum or the other, or winning an award somewhere on the continent.

I used to ask myself, mbok, wetin this man they do sef? Agric champion with possibly no farm? All these things are just fluff. We sha like to throw people up and celebrate them without really looking at what’s on “ground”

Baba spoke very eloquently, made all the right moves and supported in one or two places but the noise was just too much kai. They even started trying to push the magic towards the Nigerian Presidency.

Our politics wey the Jagabans and the Wikes of this world rule, you will now come and wear a bowtie and be doing ajebutter all over the place because some media strategy has pumped your ego to what height.

Well done my big brother. According to your media, you have done well and as such deserve all the accolades that you are getting. Oya come down from the clouds and come and set up something – employ people, put all the good talk into action and then we will truly see the real you because for now, what we see is show boy.

Emmanuel Macron: A Slap and a Reset

I don’t want to talk too much about this episode because me and the beautiful Kate Henshaw are billed to join my big sister Ruth Osime on her wonderful programme Perspective to discuss the matter.

Let me just state this though – if I were the President of France and was slapped by my 100-year-old First Lady, let us just say that there would be a change of government that day because France would either be presented with a First Lady with red face seeking their apology or they will see a naked president that day doing what he really has to do to reclaim his dignity as a Man.

Let me keep quiet for now. Thank you.

Mayen Etim: A Mother, My Mother, Our Mother

Please let me crave your indulgence to use this page and announce to the world the miracle that has been fostered in my family.

Mrs. MayenEtim is my only sister and she is married to the very powerful and influential Mr. Etim of IkotUruan in AkwaIbom State, near the airport.

For 19 years, my sister has been looking for a child. This journey has taken her through countless procedures, heart-wrenching treatments, humiliations, heartbrokenness and tears. I used to feel her pain from afar and she would not tell me because – Joe talks too much. So, she kept me away from her journey.

But from my position, I could see her pain. I felt it very closely because I could see the sadness in her eyes.

Then one day, God struck. Ohhh my God, He did not only strike, He struck in a massive way – twins. After 19 years, God said it was enough. The tears are enough, take – and he gave us one set of extremely beautiful babies.

One boy and one girl – oh my God. He brought joy and happiness to our home and our family.

Our perfect family of seven – my father, mother and five of us – have now grown to over 20 people with the addition of these two.

Everybody please say Hallelujah for me and get ready for the party. All will be invited except bonafide card-carrying members of APC. Thank you.

Onari Duke:  A Favourite Kind of Person

If I am to choose between Donald and Onari Duke, I will take Onari any day. Not that I have anything against Donald but how do you choose someone else over another who has given you afang to eat? Not just any kind of afang but the one that comes with periwinkle, snail and “okporoko,” and then served with the smoothest pounded yam.

Since that day, Onari has entered the halls of immortality in my eyes o. She can do no wrong, I tell you. If she like, let her go and join APC, I will forgive her.

She remains so eternally beautiful, quiet and elegant. The only time we differ is when I yab her “father” Pastor Adeboye, she would send me a chat: “Edgar, don’t go there,” and I would forget that she is on my broadcast list, I would fire again, especially after Baba had come out to say he either just finished drinking tea with Jehovah or that it is his prayers that is saving the Naira. Mummy would just go cold and I will not hear from her for months.

Well, so as not to risk the possibility of losing the opportunity to eat very well made afang, I have to block my ears anytime Baba Adeboye talks again about playing snooker with Jehovah.

Her Excellency is truly a model of class. Very urbane, caring and genuinely kind. She once went to visit my late mother at the hospital, showing her massively caring side and making me feel mushy towards her.

Well, I am sure some people will be wondering why all these hailings of Madam this morning. They will be saying, “Hmmmm, Edgar is looking for something, na why he dey do all these hailings.”

My people, I cannot lie, the afang is hungering me. I am shameless when it comes to freshly made afang, especially the one that comes in rich clumps of vegetables with no oil showing and garnished with little dumplings of “pomo,” and then you will now be seeing bluish periwinkles already pulled out, just lying lazily in various places on the soup and waiting for you to scoop and chew. Kai, if you have not eaten Mrs. Duke’s Afang, you have not started.

This is why that day I went there, as I was eating, I counted the mounds of pounded yam and saw six, and by the time I was on the second, His Excellency Donald came. I quickly greeted him and pushed him away before he sits down and takes one wrap and come and be pretending to talk politics so he can eat more of the afangwey no concern am.

So mummy, please, when can I come for the afang? It will be only me and maybe Editor. He has eaten afang only once in his life. Help me help this Edo man, na for him, not only me. Thank you, ma.