CCB Vs Tinubu: Triumpth Of Justice Over Jungle

For quite some time now, before the recent court ruling which eventually put paid to their bluff, the Code of Conduct Bureau had kept telling the larger public that the Action congress of Nigeria (ACN) leader, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, had a big case to answer over some multiple foreign accounts he allegedly kept during his two-term tenure as governor of Lagos State.

Of course, serving notice to the world is not so much the issue as the intimidating manner in which they usually announced to the public that they had anticipated all possible loopholes the ACN leader might ingeniously try to exploit and had plugged them.

No one who happened to have read the newspapers at that time will fail to notice the conspicuously intimidating tone with which they clearly meant to psyche down the Asiwaju, his teeming supporters and well wishers to fear.

Indeed, no one who had read their media releases, would also fail to get it well and clear, that the authorities sure had a big war to fight against the man; that there is more that meet the eyes than the mere case with the bureau and that it was a mere facade or decoy meant to post the charismatic ACN leader out of circulation. In other words, no one was really in doubt that the case was mainly political.

But this shouldn’t be any surprising, because the power cabal at the centre cannot deny the equally intimidating political influence of Asiwaju, who in the contemporary Nigerian politics, ranks as the arrowhead of the opposition and the progressive forces in Nigerian politics.

Even at a time when the demigod PDP had virtually all the states in the federation at its feet while the AD then could only boast of Lagos where Tinubu presided as governor, the fear of Asiwaju was, for the PDP, the beginning of wisdom.

This perhaps might suffice to imagine how scared stiff they suddenly turned when the enigmatic ACN leader swept the carpet off their feet in Edo, Ogun, Oyo and Osun states in such dramatic manner that they are yet to recover from till date.

Of course, the next step that naturally would come to mind, just as was done to the Great Awo, was to devise every hook or crook means, not only to stop the man, but nail his political coffin.

Indeed, the media relations arm of the bureau, deserves to be saluted for a job well done; if anything, at least, for its demonstrable skill in propaganda.

Each time they came out with their mischievously crafted press release on Asiwaju’s case; they inspired fear that almost literally turned one silly in the pant, as they would leave no one in any doubt that Tinubu, the menacing spectre and enfant terrible that stares them perpetually on the face, was already in for it at last.

The infinite benefit of this, of course, can well be appreciated against the backdrop of 2015, which was very much at the corner and leaves the coast clear for them as Asiwaju languishes in the gulag (may God forbid bad thing).

As was to be expected, this development elicited panic, sadness or joy, depending on the camp you belong to.

In the progressive camp, including even fellow Nigerian compatriots, who do not belong to any political party, reactions were partly panicky and partly defiant. The defiant category had thought that the rule of law was always there to be stretched to the most logical conclusion towards the extraction of justice. At the arrowhead of this defiant category was the “accused himself who, in his characteristic display of courage, never minced words by telling the bureau and its army of legal foot soldiers that he was indeed ready for them.

But this is not to say that the panicky categories have nothing to fear, after all, even a kindergarten of today, not born in those early 60s, are not unaware of the political turmoil of that era which was inspired in the main, by the diabolical attempt to suffocate the great Awo politically, if not physically too; at least, going by the Coker Commission of Inquiry and the treason trial both of which were stage-managed in the bid to exterminate the Great Awo.

Predictably in the camp of the adversary, it was nothing but joy galore and no less so, was it bound to be with, that the PDP top-notch in Lagos State, who had never allowed any opportunity to pass by without letting the world know that it was Tinubu who clamped him into jail as if the judiciary is Tinubu’s personal estate or the man is the president of the nation, vested with the omnipotent power to do or undo.

This man in particular and his fellow party mates, must have been jubilating that with Tinubu in gaol (may God forbid bad thing), the southwest and indeed, the hitherto elusive Lagos State, was already theirs for grabs.

But if the foregoing was understandable as the expected jubilation of a rival politician over the imminent fall of a perceived “political foe,” how then do you explain the case of a member of the fourth estate of the realm, who is supposed to preside as an unbiased umpire?

Incredibly but true, these bunch took the matter as their own personal battle and the climax of which was a nine-page pull out, in which they reached out for the ultimate in vulgar abuses and campaign of hatred and calumny against Asiwaju.

Indeed, literally speaking, they were already celebrating their doomsday expectation for the progressive ACN leader.

Thanks goodness, their expectations were dramatically dashed as the unfolding events, following the recent court ruling, has shown today, that Nigeria and indeed, the Almighty God above, is greater than us all.

Tinubu’s victory goes beyond personal victory; it is a victory of light over darkness, truth over falsehood and justice over rule of the jungle.

Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, the enigma, lives forever.

•Adekunle Ademoye, a former member of the Lagos House of Assembly, lives in Lagos