"Those who came to welcome me, they branded as celebrating corruption. What a joke. They call me ex-convict; look, I won’t be the first and won’t be the last. Mandela was an ex-convict, Baba Awolowo was an ex-convict, and these are great men. They made it look like you being there, you are finished. If you don’t go through fire, you can never rise beyond mediocrity and ideology. You cannot!"
BODE GEORGE.
Erm. I don't know where to start tearing into this fool. I only ask that no one asks me to show respect or restraint, as he deserves neither one nor the other.
I think to get my head round the nerve of the 'man', I'll analyse his statement piece by piece, giving my opinion of said creature as I go along.
"Those who came to welcome me, they branded as celebrating corruption..."
In August 2008, the EFCC under its head Farida Waziri arrested Olabode George in Lagos and arraigned him and four others on a 163 count-charge of conspiracy, disobedience to lawful order, abuse of office and alleged illegal award of contracts worth N84 billion while he was chairman of the NPA. After the trial had started, the EFCC reduced the charge to 63 counts. In October 2009, Bode George was found guilty and sentenced to jail for 30 months. The sentence was handed out by Justice Joseph Olubunmi Oyewole. The judge found the defendants guilty on 47 out of the 68 counts. The total sentences added up to 28 years, but the counts for disobedience to lawful order were ruled to run concurrently for six months, and the counts for contract inflation then to run concurrently for two years.
The above excerpt from his Wikipedia article shows they weren't wrong. If he wants to claim his Wikipedia entry is spurious, he should know that every fact mentioned is from a cited source.
"What a joke..."
As a prisoner, Chief Bode George and his colleagues were placed in the V.I.P. section of the prison. They were not required to wear prison uniforms, and were allowed to have meals prepared by their families.
Is that what a man serving time for corruption is supposed to get. If his offences had been minor then maybe this would have been fitting punishment. But here is a man who was meant to serve a 28 year sentence, who should have rotted away in a tiny cell with a tiny window near the ceiling. He should have been servedN5 crackers and pure water for breakfast and supper (no lunch). And he calls people making a valid inference a joke. His jail term was a joke!
Is that what a man serving time for corruption is supposed to get. If his offences had been minor then maybe this would have been fitting punishment. But here is a man who was meant to serve a 28 year sentence, who should have rotted away in a tiny cell with a tiny window near the ceiling. He should have been served
"They call me ex-convict; look, I won’t be the first and won’t be the last."
Well this is true. I guess there's a sliver of honesty in even the most delusional people. And as an ex-convict he should be treated like one, not feted like a hero coming back from a successful war! And in any case this sentence was only a preamble to what is one of the most ridiculous statements ever uttered by a megalomaniac.
"Mandela was an ex-convict, Baba Awolowo was an ex-convict, and these are great men"
While this statement in itself is true and expresses a noble sentiment, in the context of the entire paragraph it becomes part of the ravings of a delusional man.
Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for fighting apartheid which would ultimately have damned his country. Obafemi Awolowo was a political prisoner, a casualty of the dirty politics which is typical of 'our dear country'. Add to that list Olabode George, martyr for corruption, patron saint of dirty rotten thieves. And a great man too!
"They made it look like you being there, you are finished."
No one said that you ignorant fool, what we said is you're corrupt, your assets should be seized and donated to charity, and you should never show your face in Nigerian politics again. No one really cares if you live till you're a hundred and eighty and have a huge farm in the middle of nowhere and make billions a year, we just don't want to see your ugly face on our televisions acting like you're some kind of superhero. You're not. You're a shameless man and if you had any dignity you would quietly fade like the sun at the end of the day.
"If you don’t go through fire, you can never rise beyond mediocrity and ideology. You cannot!"
Bode dear, you can never rise above mediocrity if you don't admit your faults and attempt to make amends for them. You are such a hypocrite! You were allowed meals from home and granted VIP status! In prison! In fire terms, that's like a wet matchstick!
Okay so I've ranted and I'm cool now. It might be slightly incoherent, but I wasn't aiming to write a well structured article here - I just wanted to vent my increasing frustration with our 'leaders'. Some people call them toothless - I disagree. They're venomous, poisonous leeches. I sincerely hope we don't get to the stage where the only suitable apotropaic is revolution.
To end this, I'll use a quote from one of my favourite Nigerian politicians. I don't like him because he's a good person, but because he's a colourful figure and brought in a good replacement for himself when he left office.
"...the Yoruba say, if you crave not to be disgraced and you are, you pray for long life so that you can rectify the disgrace...
...the ludicrousness of Chief Bode George’s claim is self-evident, except of course, the chief suffers from post-prison and pre-reintegration dementia..."
BOLA TINUBU
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