Fayemi: Nigerians May Be Consumed By Misgovernance

EROMOSELE EBHOMELE

If nothing is urgently done to sanitise the Nigerian system, its citizens will end up becoming victims of self-inflicted crises, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, governor of Ekiti state, Southwest Nigeria, has warned.

Governor Fayemi, who was among prominent Nigerians at the seventh Beko Memorial Anniversary Symposium, in honour of late human rights activist, Dr. Beko Ransome-Kuti, on Sunday, declared that nobody would be spared, not even those in government, when the effect of the current situation of the country boomerangs.

He advised that to evade this, the government and the governed must immediately begin to act responsibly.

The government, he said, must also begin to work assiduously with the aim of bringing democratic dividends to the electorate.

“If we don’t do anything about the direction we are headed, we will all be victims. We must therefore stop agonising and start strategising,” he told the crowed at the event with the theme: Constitutional Gridlock: The Way Out.

He noted that a prominent consequence of misgovernance was evident in the level of insecurity which he further said has a link with the level of poverty in the country.

While discussing the theme, the governor, who said he was at the event out of a sense of duty in honour of the late Beko who assisted in leading the country to democracy, added that there was no argument concerning the flawed document being paraded in the country as the 1999 constitution.

“There’s no debate about the lies that the constitution tells against itself. What is left is for us to do the right thing,” he stressed.

He said the time had come for the country to unite against those who see governance as an opportunity for self benefit instead of for the good of all.

According to him, those “who belong to the other side do not care if Nigeria collapses.

“It is time for the civil society to reorganise and restrategise to bring back the fortunes of this country.

“We can’t stop wondering what our nation would have looked like if he was alive today.”

To this end, he said, this is the time people like Beko are needed the most in the country.

Eulogising the late Beko, Governor Fayemi said he was close to the late activist having worked under him while he was alive.

He said Beko, even at the verge of death, continued to struggle fighting against dictatorship.

He noted that the late activist never took those he fought as enemies but was only against their activities.

“I once saw him with Chief Ernest Shonekan and I was very worried. When I later asked him, he said: ‘see, I don’t have enemies. He was very pragmatic,” he said.

He was supported by majority of those at the event.

Dr. Beko Ransome-Kuti, who died seven years ago, was a prominent activist who struggled with the late Gani Fawehinmi, Prof. Wole Soyinka and a host of others for the entrenchment of democracy in the country.

Throughout his struggle, he always advocated for a Sovereign National Conference.