KASHIM SHETTIMA: AN ILL-WISH TOO MANY

 

Sen. Kashim Shettima

By Yakubu Ahmed-BK

When a politician who has, through all manner of subterfuge and political harlotry, reached a certain peak and suddenly loses it all, the frustration and desperation to return to that peak becomes so telling that some sort of lunacy sets in. No one in his right element, and no matter the level of his angst, will wish another person death – all in an ill-conceived misadventure to play out a script to mollify or placate some ruffled nerves.

Borno was agog, within the week, with a very disturbing piece of news which billowed out of the hate-filled quarters of the same self-deceiving political lepers who have since kissed the canvas politically, but who are so desperate to climb back to relevance, to the effect that, our amiable Senator had died while on a vocation in London with his family. In their imagination, the news item – even if it was true, of the death of a human being will be worth a celebration, in their warped expectation that such a death will take away their biggest obstacle, to clinging back to power or to, at least, savor the feel-good-spirit when one gets out of a debacle.

They have, no doubt, succeeded in rattling the political landscape in Borno and parts of the country because the death of a man of the caliber of Kashim Shettima, is, to begin with, big news. It also holds the potentially sad prospects of altering the equation and, perhaps opening some windows for the men of yesterday to make a re-entry and attempt cornering power to make another disastrous go at the till and conscience of the state. When their time lasted until 2011, Borno became a hub for acts of treachery, perfidy, money-for-hand-back-for-ground sell out and other acts of sophisticated banality – often orchestrated to serve personal interests, regardless of the heavy cost it portended for the future political relevance of Borno state.

President Muhammadu Buhari was a victim of that perfidy on several occasions. We are talking about that era when a Governor had the temerity to work against his own party, held nocturnal meetings with opposition elements to undermine the presidential candidate of his own party, made the resources of Borno state available for that treachery to succeed, ab-initio and planned one of Nigeria’s most celebrated electoral abracadabra which neatly sabotaged the party at the national level and costing it the presidency of the country. If Muhammadu Buhari had one tenth of their diseased heart, this man, that is today running from pillar to post and disgracing himself by gate crashing into one office to the other in Abuja shamelessly scheming a comeback to relevance through the same ticket he had so wantonly desecrated and impaired, would not have had the audacity to show his dirty face anywhere Buhari is. This is a man that has demonstrated a capacity for mischief yesterday and has proved, in his relationship with others, that he will not bat an eye to repeat it. With him in a position of authority in the party, no one of substance or of legitimate aspiration, is safe, because the very point his interest conflicts with the interest of the party and with the right fallback option, he will abandon ship after he must have, irretrievably wrecked it.

Yet, what is in it, that a death wish will play out now? In what way, with successors such as the no nonsense Professor, will the death of Kashim Shettima profit them? Has it not occurred to them that the era of their kind of politics of self preservation at all unimaginable cost, was over? Why should anyone ever harbor the ill-intentioned desire to take Borno back to those better-forgotten days of politics of prostitution? There is no doubt that, with their penchant to become relevant at all cost, they will never forgive Shettima or allow him to, if they can help it, become the reference point of the finer points of politics in Nigeria.              

Of course, there has never been a dearth of ill-feelings and hostility from the camp of those opportunistic politicians who were swept away and rendered politically irrelevant by the policies and politics of the immediate past Governor of Borno State and now Senator Kashim Shettima. I am talking about how the people-oriented and development-driven policies which opened up the space in the politics of Borno state attracted the kind of personalities in the color of the current Governor Babagana Umara Zulum and encouraged their involvement in politics and then gave them the latitude to eventually take over the reins of leadership in the state. I am also talking about the Kashim Shettima’s deliberate all-inclusive policies which made the atmosphere very hot for politicians-of-fortune and their corrupt-minded ilk who have held the state by the jugular and made it almost impossible for the likes of Professor Zulum to come anywhere near politics, not to talk of ever dreaming of assuming leadership.

Many people in and outside Borno believed that Kashim Shettima came to power in 2011 through the divine intervention of the Almighty Allah, to cleanse the dirt in the politics and leadership of Borno state. The truth is that if anybody other than Shettima had been the Governor, a Zulum – a man on a God-given mission to change the narratives of leadership from its pre-2011 self-serving past into an era to free the state from ill-defined and gangster-like voyage will not have emerged.

All said and done, the attempt to dance on the grave of Kashim Shettima by the enemies of progress of not just Borno state in particular but the nation in general has backfired and complicated matters for its promoters and authors. Instead of getting their wish, they have given currency for a backlash that has placed Kashim Shettima further away from ignominy. Death will definitely come at the appointed time, not just for Kashim Shettima, but for all of us mortals.