Bukola Saraki: What kind of Nigerian

By Joseph Edgar …

The present Governor of Kwara State used to be my friend when he was the Commissioner for Economic Planning under the Bukola Saraki administration. Another friend of mine was Kola Alagbada who served very closely with the subject of this article when he was still governor of the state. Between both of them, I began to understand the persona of the Senate President.

I used to go to Ilorin to visit the present governor in his tiny office at the State Secretariat. Once I get into his office, he would usher us in and immediately begin a long treatise on the philosophy that drives Saraki. He will spend hours on end explaining and dissecting the Bukola Saraki enigma. After hours of continuos unbreakable monotonous talk, he will now conclude that Bukola Saraki was his leader and that is that.

I will just stare at him pretending to be immersed in his talk with the hope that after all these talk, he will give me business, or at worse, at least offer me lunch. None of these ever happened in my more than five trips to Ilorin from Lagos by road. I forgive him.

Kola was my colleague and almost friend at the Nigerian Stock Exchange. Very good looking and overtly confident. You can label him one of Saraki’s boys. In one of my many trips to Ilorin, after listening to the long speeches of the present governor, then commissioner, I would be left hungry and tired. So this particular day, I called on Kola who was very excited in taking me to this restaurant where he bought me Chinese food. This food did not come for free as it gave him the opportunity to also preach the gospel according to the Oloye.

Kola tried to convince me that the best thing that can ever happen to me was for me to denounce my Akwa Ibom heritage and become a Kwaran, for only then will I understand the personage of his principal and then would my eyes be opened to the philosophy that has held the state in continuous adulation of the Sarakis.

All these made me take more than a passing interest in the person of the Senate President in a bid to understand his politics, his vision and much more importantly the role he is seeking to play in our continuous bid for national development.

I once met his father, Olusola Saraki. It was at a party in Gbagada. I learnt he was a roommate with my friend’s father at the medical school. This was a celebration of that friend’s father who had died quite early and the Baba despite his tight political schedule still found it very expedient to attend the party.

He came with a horde of political aides who all remained patient as he went in to commiserate with the widow and eventually sat on my table. Since he was in a hurry, he reached for my yet to be touched drink and food and helped himself. I almost fainted as I could not believe this level of simplicity coming from such a legend. I sat glued to my sit just staring. If it was these days of social media and selfies I would have taken a picture of him eating my Amala and smiling at me.

So you can see that I have had a long and yet very distant relationship with the senate president which I must confess has given me more than passing interest in his trajectory as he moved from being governor, through his stint as the chairman of the Governors Forum, through the senate, his role in the new PDP and now the Senate Presidency.

I am yet to fully appreciate his true worth as I have not yet gotten to that level of intimacy where I can look at him squarely in the eyes and ask some very deep and penetrative questions about his vision, his ability to collectively keep a whole state under his seeming control, his suspected fearlessness; remember he blew the whistle on corruption during the Jonathan regime, his role in forging the alliance which today morphed into the APC and much more recently the intrigues that led to his emergence as the Senate President.

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Do I see a future push for the Presidency? The answer is a resounding yes. This level of energy will not dissipate at the Senate. The lack of respect for constituted authority as can be seen in the push for the Senate Presidency is only but a dress rehearsal for a run for the Presidency. He has age on his side, an astute networker, political experience yes, so why not. But the question remains would he, and what would he be offering Nigerians.

I expect a vibrant run at the Senate, I expect a bulwark against the perceived weaknesses of this government, I expect a run from political vindictiveness which is very glaring in the seeming persecution of the EFCC Chairman at the Senate.

It will be very foolhardy for you to expect us not to link it to the present travails of Her Excellency Mrs Toyin Saraki, I expect the muting of such political clowns like Dino Melaye as this could trivialize the essence of the Saraki persona. I expect further mending of bridges within the Senate and the party at large, I expect the spread of influence to the southern part of the country. Finally, I expect a softening of the aloof image of the Senate President, a much more populist approach far from the elitist image being bandied around.

I remain from the sidelines watching and mapping his every move. I remain an interested observer as he works his way slowly but surely towards his ultimate plan even as I wish him well.

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