Date: 2015-06-10

Today, I would have loved to merely celebrate and read the dissenting views of Bukola Saraki’s armchair critics in my privacy, but I feel obliged to express my joy out of sincere respect for some APC stalwarts who stood by the Senator as soon as he decided to dump the PDP for CHANGE in spite of the threat from the National Assembly that he might lose his seat as a distinguished Senator.

While many senators felt overwhelmed and confused to make such move, Senator Bukola Saraki embraced the necessity of CHANGE in the affairs of Nigeria's politics, and with a willingness to face the consequence. He stood staunch and unshaken in the face of complexity and uncertainty in the Senate, all the CHANGE campaigners applauded his decision, in appreciation of his invaluable insights and mental skills.

Thus, soon as the long anticipated CHANGE became a reality; after a lot of heroic commitment from Senator Bukola Saraki, he made known his ambition to be trusted with the hilt of the sword as the Senate President.

Alas! There came a sudden taciturnity cooked with rants and escalated fuss from those who had initially attested to his capacity. And from the corridor of a certain megalomaniac, political character-slaughterer – the 'CHANGE Sage'; Senator Bukola Saraki 'lacked' the moral justification to head the 8th Senate. Thus began the campaign against the Leader! I was further stunned by the underground proliferation of an anti-Saraki fraudulent claim, which competent courts have genuinely struck out. Sadly, many opportunistic senators got scathed by the sabre of their so-called sage, such that they conducted a stage-managed, mock primary.

From my own vantage point, it is observed that many of the Senators who participated in the mock primary, and perhaps witnessed the charade, did so to avoid being slighted with the rubric of recalcitrance by their fellow CHANGE campaigners. But, it is one thing to plot as a political pacesetter; it's another thing to submit before the Best of Planners- the Creator of All.

Though, I remain an avowed supporter of CHANGE with respect for the CHANGE campaigners, but today, I find my indifference would be tantamount to sheer act of hypocrisy. Infact, it is pertinent, on my part; to sieve the chaff of irrational loyalty out of the wheat of conscientious objection. In the words of a wise critic, 'Some of us need to draw a line between sympathy to a party and logical analyses of our socio-political reality.’

If it is indeed obvious that nothing is beyond the ken of Senator Bukola Saraki as far as the National Assembly is concerned, why the sudden call for a mock primary?

It is alarming that Nigerian politicians amusingly allow forced morsels to travel down their throats against their wish. Today, the Like-Minds' Group of Senators under the auspices of APC has demonstrated that there is a modest, non-violent manner of rejecting imposition which is necessary for growth. Even if some shallow-minded thinkers view their rejection of the mock primary as anti-party or exclusionary faction, genuine CHANGE is finally at hand.

Congratulations to the new Senate President and his loyalists! Congratulations to Kwarans!!Congratulations to Nigeria!!! May God guide and bless him with a prosperous senatorial tenure where obstacles are turned into opportunities; and may he never become a cog in the wheel of President Muhammadu Buhari.

Sheriff Olanrewaju writes from Ilorin.