Somewhere in the world’s history, the manual and how-to guide for nobility – which is supposed to have been handed down the generational lines – must have fallen into disuse and thrown away. There is no other conceivable, rational excuse for the recent dealings involving Bello El-Rufai, his momma, a Twitter handle, and countless dissenting and disgusted voices.
It recently entered into public space that the son of Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai, Bello El-Rufai, had gotten into something of a mild disagreement with a Twitter user, @thanos_zer; a disagreement that soon evolved into an explosion of insults and threats, with the resulting debris particularly targeted at the mother of El-Rufai’s Twitter opponent.
According to reports, Bello El-Rufai had tweeted about America’s Donald Trump and his perceived inability to handle the Covid-19 pandemic with the effectiveness of true leadership; to which @thanos_zer replied and called Nigeria’s own leadership to question and whether or not El-Rufai was willing to comment on that. That was the pin in the grenade.
After a series of typed jabbers and jabs, El-Rufai allegedly took the barrel and aimed it at his opponent’s maternal parentage, stating in clear terms that he would be “passing her to [his] friends” – an obvious allusion to intimate relations – and was not expecting “Igbo sounds” – another sexual innuendo, stuffed inside tribal bigotry. Those were just the icing on the cake.
Expectedly, after Bello El-Rufai’s festering comments were made public, there were calls for investigations into the matter. Curiously, the assailant’s momma, Hadiza El-Rufai, initially defended her son’s comments, stating that it was the usual ‘gbas-gbos’ of the chatroom, that all was fair in love and war. She has however rescinded that sentiment – not that it will add stripes to a leopard’s spots.
A few folks have questioned the direction of Bello El-Rufai’s disparaging comments: if his opponent really insulted Governor El-Rufai, why did Bello El-Rufai target the mother instead? And sexually?
Well good enough, he has apologised for his disparaging comments.
It is hope that he has learnt his lessons and will not be so crude next time when reacting to issues.
