Godfatherism springing up everywhere threat to Nigeria’s democracy, Bode George raises alarm
Former Deputy National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Olabode George has raised alarm that recent events in the country caused by spring up of godfatherism everywhere are putting the nation’s nascent democracy under threat.
Addressing a press conference at his Lagos residence, the PDP chieftain noted that “Little tin pot men playing godfatherism are springing up everywhere, planting their agents across the nation.”
This, he noted, is tantamount to dismantling the fundamental core of liberty.
George also made reference to the recent elections in Osun and Ekiti states which he said were a charade and an “unspeakable demonstration of undisguised and reckless collusion between a supposedly unbiased umpire with the ruling party against the opposition.”
“The Osun incident was even more beguiling and unbelievable. It was simply daylight robbery ! There is no other way to put it!, he said.
According to him, “Leaders are now subverting the will of the people through all kinds of anomalies, forging ballot results, inciting violence, prostituting the sacredness of the polling booths through vote buying and outright sabotaging of the electoral codes.”
He insisted that current developments if not brought under control could thwart the democratic gains and efforts of the founding fathers in building bridges across the country.
He said, “Our founding fathers built bridges that traversed the limiting boundaries of cultural heritage. They cultivated the plural advantages of geography and traditional linkages to create diverse economies that spawned the groundnut pyramids of the North, the sprawling cocoa industry of the West and the palm oil entrepreneurial vastness of the East.
“Each region was swollen in huge nativity of its wealth; contented, proud of its own attainments, determined and firm in the pursuit of its own excellence.
“Then partisan envy, greed and prejudicial leadership surfaced, fracturing the brotherhood of old, destroying the long built trust and amity, triggering violence, rupturing the peace that once held us together, invariably provoking a murderous civil war that claimed millions of our compatriots.
“We must never stray along this destructive path again. We must refrain from any recourse that would shatter our collective commitment to enhance the development and the growth of our nation.”
Saying the whole world is now looking at Nigeria “with shock and unbelievability, wondering why are we destroying the beauty of the very core of democracy”, George stressed that democracy is degraded when the sovereignty of the people is disregarded in the selfish interest to entrench personal whims and caprices.
