In my last piece for the year 2023, precisely on the 27th of December, I posed the question in an article entitled: ABUSIVE GODFATHERISM: IS WIKE NOT OVEREACHING HIMSELF? It is now apparent that Wike has overreached himself by the way he is handling his premature fallout with Governor Sim Fubara, who he unilaterally handpicked as successor.
If there was still any doubt about my fear for Wike, the result of the Rivers State Local Government elections held last Saturday in which the APP, the party fronting for Fubara, swept the polls which, unless subsequently torpedoed by a judicial ambush, is a confirmation of the fact that Wike’s hasty efforts to deal with his aberrant Godson was a political mistake.
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Whatever quantum of clout that he once possessed as governor of Rivers State has now lawfully devolved on Fubara. Therefore, recklessly going after him for whatever reasons only suggests that he has not read Achebe’s famous book, Things Fall Apart, where Uzeudu, the oldest man in Umuofia clan warned Okonkwo about getting himself involved in the killing of Ikemefuna as was directed by the village oracle because it is not all that is possible that is necessarily advisable: “That boy calls you father. Do not bear a hand in his death”.
Unfortunately, Okonkwo, not wanting to be thought of as weak killed Ikemefuna, slicing his ‘son’ with his own machete. That chilling incident marked the downfall of Okonkwo, culminating in his ignominious suicide by hanging. Wike is mistaking to still believe there is any justification for his open spat with Fubara, no matter the provocations, because he would be committing a moral sacrilege by wanting to kill a ‘boy’ who reverently calls him “Oga.” Let wisdom prevail, Oga Wike.
