One year after: Lucky’s fated emergence, associated angst and the commerce of owning Aketi By Debo Akinbami

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One year after: Lucky’s fated emergence, associated angst and the commerce of owning Aketi

-Debo Akinbami

As a deputy governor, Lucky Aiyedatiwa walked on egg-shells. Yes, before Aketi, his erstwhile boss, took the final sleep. Why did he? Was it the case that he was being innately sloth-shy as hastily theorized by some ideologues? Was he merely aligning to the season’s political intrigues, or he was acting a beguiling, ambitious conformist. It is doubtful that Lucky was exactly stooping to win imminent spoils. Since Àkétì’s death was in the future at the time, one would have been in error to conclude that Lucky’s acquiescing posture was in anticipation of Àkétì’s demise – to take over. That was, in fact, beyond mortal knowing.

Lucky must have comformed in what reads like a strategic buffoonery. He could understandably have done that to be politically correct as a deputy governorship candidate. Maybe to win the heart of his boss and endear himself to his immediate family who were a huge influence. He must have acted a fool to retain his position and possibly position himself as a probable successor. That was not out of place since not a few got positions in Àkétì’s government through the influence of his immediate family. It was an era when even cabinet members struggled for the qualifying tags as ‘Arabinrin sons’ or ‘Arabinrin daughters’- including those who now feign turncoats under Aiyedatiwa.

As is usual with Nigeria’s brand of politics, aptitude at puppeteering and sycophancy would readily qualify one for juicier political positions than the mileage intellect or academic testimonials would do. Such qualifications as nepotism, ‘yesmanism’, social or spiritual ties, tribal or religious qualifications are usually stronger considerations than intellect and competence.

Lucky occupied that space as a manipulable alternative to his stubbornly uncompromising predecessor, Agboola Ajayi. He strove, albeit unsatisfactorily, to bend where Agboola would not. By this complicit posture, Lucky made the office of deputy governor nearly unattractive to some of us who merely watched the drama unfold. I may return to this after now or elsewhere in future essays. Looking back, he (Lucky) paid unlikely sacrifices under the circumstances to have maneuvered and survived those slippery seasons.

But did he actually survive? Or he was merely helped by certain fortuitous circumstances that subdued mortal ploys, perhaps as compensatory incidences for a man who virtually lost himself to the ploy of enduring (or enjoying?) being plundered in silence. Maybe he did not endure enough to deserve stepping into Àkétì’s shoes that were in the hands of those who own Àkétì. Those who own Àkétì defined what constituted the “truth” for Aketi at the dying minute. They designed and decided the letters of loyalty or betrayal as they deemed necessary. He is a saint whom they declared as saintly and an infidel whom they so pronounced! The “owners” did plethora harm to the deputy as it did to the state, and would not cease until the former governor’s body was interred. Even so, the inexplicable angst subsists beyond Àkétì’s committal.

The mystery of how the “impatient”, “disloyal” and “unpreffered” Lucky stepped into the shoes that its ‘owners’ adjudged as undeserving for him necessarily explains the angst that endures and other associated issues. One may necessarily worry if these suppositions had in fact punctuate the making of a deputy for the intrepid Oluwarotimi Akeredolu. Or if deputising Aketi had actually warranted the many chaos. To answer this, I shall lend Biodun Jeyifo’s description of a man as a creature of sentiment. And, if, indeed, we’re, as mortals, a creature of sentiment, that, per force suggests that not even Àkétì, in spite of his sterling performances, is precluded from mortal flaws.

Ownership mentality around public servants, especially the Chief executives, as exampled in this treatise, has done no meager harm to the body politic. And where and when this is not nipped in the bud, its consequences sprout fast and hurt the state direly. Ondo State has had and coped with its share of the beatified anomaly. It has even managed to take another leap by electing a new governor in Lucky Aiyedatiwa, and, in so doing, offered the state a clean slate. While it is unlikely that Lucky, who himself was a victim of a ridiculously distractive ownership mentality, would indulge a repeat of same shaming tradition at the detriment of the state, those who have since profited from the trade called “Àkétì’s people” while it lasted should forthwith cease the sour show in deference to citizens’ sensibilities.

Àkétì did his best while in the saddle. He did well for the state and his county. He prioritised citizens’ welfare and spoke in their defense where others hid their heads. He was a people’s person who cultivated good friendship throughout life. He even nurtured a clement relationship with Lucky Aiyedatiwa, as then his deputy, until he was bodily ill and “his owners” took over, and their words became the law. Àkétì, in spite of these ifs and buts, left good legacies and it should matter to those who had unselfish love for him how to preserve the fine legacies.

Whatever happens after now, the fact we must all acknowledge, irrespective of where we stand on the divide, is that Lucky himself remains Àkétì’s biggest legacy. Àkétì gave Ondo state the person of Lucky Aiyedatiwa as his deputy in the first place and that in itself nullifies the new, contradicting narratives. Need I add that now that Lucky Aiyedatiwa is the substantive governor, the mortality of other attributable material legacies of Aketi may largely depend on what Lucky- his sturdiest legacies – does with them?

***Akinbami, Mass Communication lecturer at Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba Akoko, served as Special Assistant on Media and Archives to former Governor Rotimi Akeredolu.

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