By Prince Justice J Faloye
Prof Soyinka differentiated between Peter Obi and the Obidient Movement, while denying that Peter Obi’s visit to him was not about reconciliation. He said he had no problems with Peter Obi nor Labour Party, which is understandabe and right, but he went further to denigrate the Obidient Movement. One can’t but wonder why Prof keeps throwing poetic bombs.
It is understandable that a Poet is more comfortable with ironies, metaphors, totems and symbolism in general, but the hungry angry youth don’t have the luxury of esotericism. The truth is that without the Obidient Movement there will be no Peter Obi as president candidate of Labour Party, who are just drivers of what he dismissed as a ‘spectral emanation’. It is the masses yearnings for distributive justice, economically and politically that employed Peter Obi and Labour Party as SPV, special political vehicles.
Basically the people require a system that works for them and believe Peter Obi’s penchant for reducing the cost of governance fits the bill. His consumption to production mantra ties to the need for industrialization to provide jobs, which will be best spurred by the emergency construction of three West to East railway lines – Lagos to Calabar, Ilorin to Yola, Sokoto to Maiduguri, since railways being the largest iron productive system is globally recognized to spur innovation with iron which leads to industrialization. Nigerians need a just and stable epistemic meritocratic democracy, which can only be achieved with a balance of power poised on a two powerbase structure, preferably civilizational since Nigeria is made up of two civilizations – Indigenous African (Yoruba, Igbo South and Middlebelt) and Afro-Arabic (Hausa, Fulani Kanuri Middlebelt), with the Middlebelt being the swing states of national conscience. Unfortunately coloniality of power and knowledge continues to rob our people of these demands.
With the fastest growing youth population jobless in the poverty capital of the world, the silent majority are agitated, and have been agitated for awhile. People have no choice but to now, according to Prof Soyinka, fascistically Soro Soke for good governance to end poverty, unemployment, cultural injustice, corruption etc. This public anger has been building from the 2012 Fuel subsidy occupy Protests that culminated into the Sai Baba Buhari anti corruption crusade, which ended up dashing their hopes, and frustrated them into the 2020 EndSars Riots. Though some people claim the protests were externally instigated, they can’t deny that the Masses were already restive, and the puppeters will lose control if their yearnings are not fulfilled.
The current global polycrisis reminds one of the 1900s when the global masses became restive, as Tsarist Russia became communists, Germans became Nazis, Italians fascist, while Blacks clamoured for civil Rights, forcing the Western nations to acquiesce to demands for immediate distributive justice – politically with independence and civil rights for Blacks and economically with welfarism for the masses. Unfortunately It appears that there were better statesmen in the 1900s that could read the writing on wall better than the present statesmen not only in Nigeria but global political leadership. From British Brexit to USA Trumpism and humanitarian militarism to Nigeria Emilokanism entitlement standards of the political classes have fallen.
As an Economist, I study trends and believe the Age of anti-Intellectualism has blinded humanity to what Prof Soyinkas called a fathomless pit of the damned. Yes, the outgoing global consciousness might have damned the majority into a poverty trap but they are not fathomless. They are fathomless to those that don’t understand trends best understood through African Spiritual Science.
The Obidient Movement is basically the reincarnation of the 1938 Nigerian Youth Movement, based on the 84 year Shango cycle of Justice Movements. These cycles are universal cycles and the 84yr trends become obvious, locally, when considering Nigeria’s 2022 for Obidients Movement for distributive justice, 1938 for National Youth Movement for civil rights and justice, 1854 for Oyo Atiba, 1770s for Bashorun Gaa and Abiodun anti slavery movement. To make it more interesting, three Shango 84 year cycles equals one 250yr cycle of Oya that blows away global structures that uphold the status quo. It is the threat of bringing down the status quo structures that makes Prof Soyinka and others believe Obidient Movement is fascist.
Call it what you want, the budding Youth Movement can’t be wished away or swept under the proverbial mat that he contemplated of using to walk over the fathomless pit. It is romantic to believe that Nigeria’s collective psyche won’t exhibit the signs of brutal suppression of it’s citizens economic and political rights by the ‘leadership’. If Peter Obi and Labour Party don’t fulfil current collective aspirations, they will be swept aside by the Obidient Movement that would organically transmogrify into a bloody revolution pretty soon.
I have fully explained in another article how the Oya 250yr cycle of revolutionary change has offered Nigeria three chances to change and evolve to a higher level of political consciousness. The first being electoral revolution that was derailed in February at 29 degrees, the second being the judicial revolution in May, which if fails will lead to a bloody revolution the third time Oya passes the 29 degrees of structure (Obaluaye) like the 1770s American Revolutionary for independence..
There are some people that believe that the current winds of revolutionary change that occurs every 250 years won’t change much, apart from regimes. The last 250 year cycle of collapsing political structures globally was the 1770 to 1790s when we had American, French and Haitian Revolutions, which followed the previous 250 year cycle of 1520s with the breakup of the 1500 year Roman Catholic Empire, the breakup of the Ife civilization into Oyo and Edo military territories, preceded by the 1270s defeat of Islamic Europe, introduction of guns and paper money. In these changes power switched within civilizations, first within the Abrahamic civilizations in 1270, then over slavery injustice from the Roman Catholic Iberians to the British and French in 1520s, then to the European Americans in 1770s.
However eight Oya 250 year cycles transform into the 2000 year complete civilizational change and global consciousness, so the Haitian Ogun Revolution 250yrs ago that brought African freedom from slavery to colonization/neocolonisation is likely to push for absolute Black freedom and racial parity in a multi-polar world system this 250yr cycle. This is exactly where we are in Nigeria, and it can’t be stopped which is why the leadership is blinded to the imminent change.
Prof Soyinkas is advised to engage deeper with the real change that he calls fascist instead of it’s symbolism and SPVs. Like the Biblical story of a rich man in hell begging the poor in heaven for a drop of water, even if sweat drops, it is believed that very soon all those across the world that resist the yearnings for Revolutionary change to the status quo, will be swept away into the dustbin of History, the bottomless pit.
