The Thug-In-Chief of Ibadan passes

The Thug-In-Chief of Ibadan passes

More details have emerged over the circumstances surrounding the death of Mr. Lamidi Adedibu, the self-styled strongman of Ibadan politics. Reliable sources in Ibadan just told Saharareporters that Adedibu died on his way back from Lagos where he went to renew his UK visa for a planned medical trip to London. According to several sources, the dreaded politician started shivering after his vehicle passed Ogere village on the Lagos-Ibadan highway. He died shortly after. His body was later deposited at the University College Hospital (UCH) in Ibadan, Oyo State.

As expected, Adedibu's death has elicited widespread jubilation in Ibadan, a city where the late gadfly sharpened and practiced his thuggish brand of politics. One observer told Saharareporters that people were seen in different parts of the city rejoicing over Mr. Adedibu’s demise. There are reports of attacks on innocent citizens by his thugs who have taken over some strategic parts of Ibadan to mourn his passing.

Adedibu’s style of politics, which included use of political thugs and street gangs to maim and intimidate political opponents, has caused pain, anguish and frustration to the people of Oyo State in the Southwest. That violent legacy accounts for the sense of relief and even celebration at Mr. Adedibu’s passing.

Incidentally, Adedibu died on the eve of planned nationwide remembrance of Nigeria's freest and fairest elections, conducted on June 12 1993. Former military dictator, Ibrahim Babangida with the active collaboration of notable civilian co-conspirators, including Adedibu, saw to the annulment of the election. That decision threw Nigeria into prolonged political turmoil and made the country a pariah for several years.

Saharareporters has received conflicting reports over the burial of Adedibu. Some sources told Saharareporters that the Chief Imam of Ibadan, Alhaji Liadi Inakoju, has refused to perform final burial rites on the late politician.
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who is currently in Ibadan, is reportedly prevailing on the Chief Imam of Ibadan to reconsider his resistance so that Adedibu may be buried tomorrow at 2 :00 p.m. in accordance with Muslim rites.

During his eight-year reign, Mr. Obasanjo empowered Adedibu to terrorize the people of Oyo State. The former president shielded Adedibu with massive police escorts and allowed the late politician to get away with violent attacks on political opponents. Mr. Obasanjo, who is also widely despised in Nigeria, once described Adedibu as “my leader.”

LAGOS AC REACTS TO ADEDIBU’S DEATH

The Lagos State chapter of the Action Congress has reacted to the death of Chief Lamidi Adedibu, the self-styled strong man of Ibadan politics. The party, while sympathizing with the family and political allies of the late politician, sees his death as offering a vista of hope to the people of Oyo State to recover their state from the pith of darkness, which Adedibu, with the active connivance with the former president, Olusegun Obasanjo plunged the state into in one of the most bizarre political perversions ever perpetrated in the history of Nigeria.

In a release in Lagos, signed by the party’s Lagos State Publicity Secretary, Joe Igbokwe, Lagos AC expressed the belief that all Nigerians will learn positively from the death of Adedibu and the central lesson is that no aberration lasts forever.

“As Africans, we believe firmly that the dead deserve to be allowed to rest in peace. We are schooled in the belief that it is not good to speak ill of the dead because the person will not be able to defend himself and we are not about to contest that belief. But we believe that sometimes, death can open the door to a positive future that needs to be explored for human society to progress. The death of Adedibu offers the people of Oyo State and indeed the entire South West the opportunity to recover the monumental political grounds they lost to Adedibu’s kind of politics and re-position their region and state for better political era free from the brute politics Adedibu promoted.

“While we commiserate with the family and friends of Adedibu, we see his death from the bigger picture of the sanity and freedom it offers the South West to put their greatly perverted politics aright and recover the grounds lost to the brand of politics Adedibu promoted in the region. While we wish Adedibu a sweet repose, we believe that his death will free those enslaved in his vice grips, the countless thugs and urchins recruited to enforce the kind of strange political culture he perpetrated in Oyo State in the period Obasanjo ruled over this country. Adedibu’s death will offer his disciples the opportunity to retreat from the negative politics he promoted in Oyo State and chart a newer life of political sanity. It will offer all those negatively oriented about politic the opportunity to re-orientate themselves about the real meaning of politics as the process through which the people attain the highest possible level of satisfaction through a free and fair electoral process. This is at variance with the kind of gbegiri, amala, ewedu and ponmo politics, which Adedibu made the cornerstone of his politics while he lived. This has accounted for why a region that should lead the way to matured political practice in Nigeria is now being led by renegades and reprobates whose only claim to political glory is their degree of service to a primitive cult order that anchors its strength on how well it promotes modern day slavery.

“We call on all South Westerners to rally round a progressive leadership and recover their lands from the impostors who were recruited by Adedibu, sponsored by Obasanjo and forced down on the people for the purpose of enslaving the Yoruba people. We call on Adedibu’s disciples to reform themselves and adjust to the reality that politics must be refined and the people made an essential part of the process.

“Once more, we commiserate with Adedibu’s family and associates and urge them to bear the loss with fortitude and grant them the large heart to embrace reforms as an essential part of post-Adedibu politics.”

Joe Igbokwe.

Publicity Secretary,
Lagos AC