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DEAR MR. ATIKU

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2019: Atiku, Ezekwesili finally sign peace accord

By Joseph Edgar…

Your candidacy has come full circle. From the ashes of rejection and pity you emerged due to your strength of character the flag bearer for the PDP in this elections. Dear Mr. Atiku, I must congratulate you for the turnaround, the energy and the colour you have brought to the campaigns.

Nigerians have watched you very closely. Watched you thread the slippery road to national salvation. You have been called names, cursed and abused. In other places you have been hailed, praised and sang about as the new messiah emerging to uplift a fallen people from the throes of despair.

Mr. Atiku, let me blunt. You are not the messiah as you have been a very important player and member of the cabal that has kept us in the national quagmire we find ourselves. Let me say at this point that you deserve to a large extent some of the opprobrium that has been thrown at you, and Obasanjo’s latest turnaround does not in any way erase the invectives and verbal assault he hauled at you over the last ten years.

But all that said, we have found ourselves as a nation in a state of inertia. We have in our collective wisdom thrown you and Mr. Buhari up as leprous choices for leadership. For me, this is a ‘ten and ten pence’ situation where any which way we decide to go we may not witness any significant change in our situation except for the fact that in your case, you may be a little bit tolerant of opposition.

Read also: DEAR MR. BUHARI

My prayer to you these last few hours to the elections is for you to kindly morph into the statesman role. The need for you to respect the wishes of Nigerians remains sacrosanct and would determine if you would eternally revamp your image and positioning or not. You have run a very charismatic campaign, removed the thunder from the campaign of your opponent and shown enough strength and capacity to wrest control and lead us to the chosen land. But Nigerians still have to make the ultimate decision and you will have to respect that decision no matter what it is.

The critical core of our existence as Nigerians lays with your reaction after the election results are announced. The lives of millions of Nigerians, their destiny and that of their children born and yet unborn will rely on the level of maturity you are expected to show from Saturday.

Any attempt to begin to exhibit the immaturity we have seen in the recent past will certainly throw us into the gates of Hades and firmly put your name in the dustbin of history. You must be wary of the pharisees, the ones who will be whispering into your ears and the ones who for selfish gains would edge you into ‘stupidity’. You must remain calm, patient and consult very wildly before taking any step.

Should you win this election, you must emerge as a magnanimous leader. You must immediately stretch your hands out to your opponents and provide a sane environment for continuous dialogue, negotiations and a processed handover devoid of gloating and if the decisions goes against you, then you smile and say thank you to Nigerians and silently slide back into the shadows.

I wish you well, you have fought the good fight and God will guide us all to take a decision that will augur well for our nation.

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