The acquittal of citizen Saraki

I could’ve predicted with Nostradamic alacrity, the outcome of last week’s mistrial of Olubukola Saraki. Only a wicked fool could have fallen for the charade that a man whose assets are an open secret could be charged with false declaration of assets. Such a puerile charge would stick to a suspect paraded on Crime Fighters, […]

I could’ve predicted with Nostradamic alacrity, the outcome of last week’s mistrial of Olubukola Saraki. Only a wicked fool could have fallen for the charade that a man whose assets are an open secret could be charged with false declaration of assets. Such a puerile charge would stick to a suspect paraded on Crime Fighters, not someone who deftly planted himself as the third most powerful political figure of a nation fighting kwarrupshan. A charge on the scion of the Saraki dynasty is water on a duck’s back, a path well worn by the Sarakis. In 2003, a similar witch-hunt by the NDLEA into the collapse of the Societe-Generale Bank only increased the popularity of Olusola Saraki, aka Oloye. Now lightening is striking for the second time with similar effect. If history had not been cancelled in schools and across national psyche, all the heat of the past two years could have been avoided and perhaps even disgruntled Biafrans wouldn’t have ignited the polity.

As his name implies, extraordinary citizen Saraki came to add to the wealth, honour and now the notoriety of his late father, the Oloye. The Sarakis own Kwara, lock, stock and barrel and they are on the verge of extending that influence on the federal landscape if rumours that a new cabal prevented Hajiya Buhari from seeing her husband in a London hospital have a modicum of veracity. Unlike the Eyademas and the Kabilas who hijacked their entire countries, the Sarakis are modest people who juggle political positions for their children. When one is at the centre, the other plays in the fringes. 

Recent history shows that while Bukola held sway in Kwara, his sister gave him the distance in Abuja as a ranking sinator. If the Sarakis were greedy, even Kwara would have been named after them without a whimper. It is on record that since the state was created, anyone who became anything of note owed his or her allegiance to the Saraki dynasty. Other people would have taken Kwara’s revenue allocation in prospect, but not Bukola. He may be a trained doctor, he never takes anything that has no seal of approval – ask those who were burnt trying to make a molehill out of the mountain of his official car.

Before he left Government House, Ilorin, Bukola asked state assembly approval for a severance package. They honoured the request, giving him for life a salary equal to any incumbent, an insurance against Naira/dollar fluctuations. They added state-sponsored medical trips abroad for himself, wife and children in case Mama Charlie withdraws the privileges accorded to citizens in the service of former colonies. The Sarakis already hold British citizenship and are covered by the famous NHS. Saraki’s cars would be replaced eternally every couple of years and he goes with a driver to drive them; he gets two houses built and furnished to taste outside Kwara. So popular were these perks that lesser governors whose combined ancestral weight could not move the chimes of Big Ben decided to copy it ho-ha – apology to Chief Zebrudaya! 

Whatever the Sarakis have, they have worked for. The son has trailed his father in ambition, something most fathers wish for their children. Oloye was second republic sinnate leader and the son is now president of the same chamber having glued himself to the chair with comfort, ease and presiding candour. Space would not permit me to dig into the generosity of the Sarakis since the days when a fiver (yes, five Naira) could juggle with dollars and cents. In those days, every Friday was Sallah day at the Sarakis and those who got the handshake branched off at Oja Oba to shop for the week’s soup ingredients. Oh those days!

I have gone this far to inform the wicked and the uninformed who sought to see a Saraki in jail that their wish would only come true when flies could be placed in handcuffs. The assets of Bukola Saraki are well gazetted; check the Library of Congress. To claim that he did not declare his assets is the height of mischief and an attempt at political witch-hunting. We have a country where a president’s mandate is not affected either by their missing thesis or school certificate; where the national legislature transcribes a radio broadcast then adopts it as a doctrine of necessity.

Let us join millions of grinning Dino Melayes to lead groups to congratulate sinator Saraki for defeating his enemies at the Code of Conduct tribunal. This is how the ruining party fulfils its ambitious mandate to stay on 200 years even if Biafra, Arewa and Oduduwa secede. This ruling is a watershed in Sai Baba’s anti-kwarupshan fight. May Saint Saraki live long to fulfil his political destiny. May the forces of democracy unleash its full wrath on anything that seeks to separate Naija from this legendary palm oil with which the yam of governance is eaten. May Magu’s traps continue to catch the rats and rabbits of sleaze as it lets off the behemoths.