By Charles Okogene
One of the measures to checkmate the continued spread of Coronavirus is to avoid large gathering among others. And many states in Nigeria and countries the world over, have been drumming that into the ears of its citizens. Others are washing their hands per second per second with soap and maintaining safe distance.
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However, all that is alien to the Oyo State government and the South West states chapters of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Both the state and party chose this period when the whole world is in panic mode and adamantly went ahead with its planned reconciliation rally at Mapo Hall, Ibadan the state capital; and it was well attended as expected. Despite the fact that the world is campaigning against gatherings of up to 50 persons, the party care less about that. It is not bothered about the lives of people it is aspiring to govern; it gathered them in a venue to preach arrant nonsense in the name of reconciling its members who could not stand the lack of internal democracy that rocked the party’s boat before the 2015 general elections, which it lost to the All Progressives Congress (APC). What in the world, would have made the party to go ahead with the rally? No one can say. Rather, it simply shows that the part and the state government in particular, do not care about the welfare of the people it pretends to govern or wants to rule over again at the federal level.
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Looking back into history, one is not surprised because the party is known for such juvenile behaviour. In 2014 at the height of insurgents detonation of bombs everywhere and anywhere in the entire northern states especially North East, the leadership of PDP, President Jonathan chose to go campaigning/partying few days after the insurgents dropped their bomb, which sent many to their untimely grave in a motor park in Abuja.
PDP never cared, its president Jonathan who was then the occupant of Aso Villa chose to ‘dance’ on the graves of the innocent victims. Same thing it did when Chibok school girls were abducted. Rather than swing into action when the news of the abduction hit town, the party, the government of the day at the federal level, Jonathan and his wife, Patience, spent weeks doubting the veracity of the news. It becomes more worrisome if viewed from the prism that the only death the nation has recorded so far courtesy of the Coronavirus is that of a young American that spent weeks in Ibadan before going to Ekiti where he took ill and finally died. Ibadan? yes the same Ibadan where PDPheld that jamboree called reconciliation rally. Is that not enough concern for the governor of the state, Seyi Makinde, to worry about. Worry about how many the dead American must have come in contact with before his journey to Ekiti and death? No, Makinde is only concerned about Amotekun and how it can make Oyo State safer than anywhere in the world.
After its (PDP) fall from grace, one would have thought that the party and its leaders have learnt their lessons. The Ibadan rally coming when the whole world is leaving in fear of Coronavirus, shows that the party has not learn anything from history; that old habit really die hard.
