Chuks
Iloegbunam
THE CYPHER is said to wish that his “cold and iron” dispensation is revalidated on
Saturday February 16, 2019. It cannot be realistically stated that, deep down,
he really and truly yearns reelection. He is not there. It can only be repeated
what those behind the Mask have put out: that the Cypher covets a second term
of office! This is the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English’s third
ordinary meaning of Cypher (also spelt as Cipher): Zero.
Two
questions are apposite: One, why does the epitome of Nothingness seek continued
“leadership” over a country of nearly 200 million people? Two, why is there
this insistent spectacle of a multitude salaaming Zero, positing him as the
Mostest, and threatening that without his continued tenancy of Aso Rock, they
would scatter the ground? The answers are blowing in the wind. But,
before spelling things out for general benefit, another sentence or two on the
theme of definitions.
The
Cypher had a grand ride in 2015 because there was an avalanche of propaganda
that blighted the sensory perceptions of those deserving of being exposed to
the truth. The national swindle was orchestrated by a motley collection of
deceitful hypocrites. Things since changed. The taste of the pudding is in the
eating. Or, as Nigerians put it in marriage register, after a sampling of
spouses one is placed in an unimpeachable position to determine the better
husband or better wife. Or, again, as Stephen Osita Osadebe, the late, great
Highlife music superstar sang it, “You step forward, you retreat. You repeat
the going forth and coming back. Then you decide for yourself which, between
moving forward and backwards is the better option
The
verdict is out there. People are fed up to the hairline with a government that
is inchoate in character, nebulous in policy, callous in relating to the masses
and encased in a veritable tissue of lies. People with conscience will never
stop asking why more than 300 Shiites were massacred under the Cypher’s watch.
This is a crime against humanity. People with conscience will never stop asking
why IPOB agitators were buried by the hundreds in mire or put down by automatic
gunfire. That is another crime against humanity. Are there not people today
that consider themselves high but are liable to be docked at the International
Criminal Court in the foreseeable future?
THE GREATEST lament, though, is that the nation hurtles at a speed dangerously
conjured by the force of Zero. Even Cypher’s wife went public to announce that
the husband was not in charge. What could be more damning? What other testament
could hold better accord with veracity, even if that truth currently appears
only latent in certain quarters? In creative and serious settings someone
mostly unaware of their circumstances cannot possibly be entrusted with the
responsibility of climbing up or down a flight of stairs. People who put such a
mentally disarticulated person up for national leadership do incalculable harm
to humankind because the contingency of their success is not of their candidate
stumbling to a broken neck, but one of reducing the entity to a tinderbox.
That
is why the Cypher is not electable. That is why he is certain to lose the
February 16 ballot.
TO RETURN to the two questions in paragraph two. The Cypher is not the one
insisting on continued direction of the nation’s affairs. Incongruous Faces
behind the Mask are responsible for the clearly avoidable calamity. If the
Cypher stays, the Incongruous Faces get a fresh “mandate” for even wilder
political excesses and further propagation of their ideological dubieties. Some
of those shouting themselves hoarse at campaign stops and others restless with
posting mendacity on the Internet cannot realistically believe themselves.
Shame reduced a broad swathe of their kind to self-inflicted anonymity. Many of
them are in it for the coins, reeling as they are from the remorseless
pummeling of the prevailing hard times. One of them boasted that his
family lived abroad and he owned an American passport that he always carried
about. If a conflagration resulted from a terrible choice, he would hit the
nearest airport and hop on the first available aircraft!
Some
from the educated but uncritical fringe cite the prophecy that Cypher was
incapable of lasting another four years, for which reason he should be retained
on a post more complex than his faculties since he would sooner peg off for
their own man to mount the saddle. Apart from being irreligious, their attitude
is as senseless as hoping that an unserviceable aircraft with a drunk at the
controls would make a trans-Pacific flight to deliver Eldorado. Besides, the
proponents have not reckoned with the fact that senility is not the same thing
as imminent demise. Cypher could outlive most of those expecting him to drop
dead almost anytime.
AT THE LAST WORD, the fear is not the outcome of the presidential ballot. That one
is settled. The mind-numbing fear is whether the umpire will not turn out to be
wilful and, thus, announce other than the people’s verdict.
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Chuks Iloegbunam is a distinguished journalist and author of Ironside, 1999 (iloegbunam@hotmail.com))
Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe
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