“Prometheus Bound” is an ancient Greek tragedy written by Aeschylus. It is about a clash between power-drunk Zeus (Jupiter) and the immovable will of Prometheus. It also revolves around the interplay of justice and fate. In the play, Zeus plans to destroy humanity. But Prometheus, a Titan, defies him by giving out the secret of fire just to save mankind. For this act of defiance, Zeus orders that he be chained to the mountains and perpetually tortured.
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The Labour Party presidential candidate in the 2023 election, Mr. Peter Obi, has become Nigeria’s Prometheus. When I wrote “Peter Obi has become their nightmare” last year, I never knew that it was still morning on creation day then. In that piece, published on September 26, 2022, I chronicled various attacks on Obi as he prepared to campaign for the presidential election then. I noted that they wanted to deploy lies and half truths to de-market him. Then, spokesmen and hirelings of the ruling party made Obi both the subject and object of their campaigns. I wondered why they were having nightmares about someone who didn’t have structure like they claimed; someone who was purportedly a social media creation. Rather than discuss what they could do to deliver Nigeria from the bondage of misrule, insecurity and economic stagnation, I added, they busied themselves fighting to pull down a man whom God had anointed.
I noted, “His traducers have tried to link him with the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). It has not worked. They have scrutinized him in and out but found nothing incriminating. Hence, they have vowed to manufacture incredible tales against him and make them look real by attributing them to some credible newspapers. There was this particular false story about a certain young woman who accused him of forcing her to engage in drug peddling and using her as a sex toy. The Sun newspaper was said to have published it. It happens to be a figment of the imagination of the hired writer as The Sun never published such fiction. The way things are going, I won’t be surprised if a woman somewhere misses her period tomorrow and accuses Obi of being responsible. Unfortunately for them, whoever is pursuing a chick will always stumble and fall while the chick will always scamper away unscathed.”
Now, both the campaigns and elections are over. The ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) performed some abracadabra called election on February 25 this year. After that show of shame, they asked aggrieved parties to go to court.
Obi and some others have gone to court. But rather than allow the court processes to follow the natural course, some goons in and around the corridors of power have continued to harass and embarrass the man whose only crime is his desire to change the bad narratives in his country.
The latest shenanigans against him came in form of his impersonation, which led to his brief detention at Heathrow Airport in London. Obi, who has lived in London for decades, suddenly became a prime suspect for crime. The immigration officials in London pulled him aside for interrogation. But some Nigerians around cried foul and wondered why he was being detained. Eventually, he was released and he is back in the country. Reports have attributed Obi’s ordeal to the APC.
This scenario happened a few days after the revelation by Obi that he was being pressured to leave Nigeria. He refused to leave, saying Nigeria was his country and he was going nowhere. They have scrutinized his accounts. They have tried to entrap him with women. They said he was plotting an interim government and had, thus, committed treason. Information and Culture Minister, Lai Mohammed, had to travel to Washington DC to inform the world about the treason charge. So far, they have failed and will continue to fail.
The irony in all this is that they said Obi came third in the election. Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was allocated the second position. But they have left the man who came second to tackle the one who purportedly came third. There is nothing they have not done to cow him. But he remains unfazed.
Obi’s travails are an indication of one thing: he is a threat to their plots to legitimize a flawed election and continue their rapacious rape of the country’s resources. But it will not augur well for them.
Obi and the Obidient Movement have come to stay. Here is someone they said had no structure. He has shown what he could do even without a criminal structure. He has shown that Nigerians across ethnic and religious divides desire good leadership and want Nigeria to be better. The only problem is the few corrupt and selfish individuals who want the continued stagnation of the country so that they can continue to milk it dry.
Well, you can cow people for some time, you can intimidate them for a while, but there comes a time when they will say enough is enough. Nigeria has reached that point because the majority of the citizens have suffered enough. They appear to be silent but what we have now is silence of the graveyard. They are watching to see how the tribunals will handle the cases before them.
In my earlier mentioned piece, “Peter Obi has become their nightmare,” I quoted the words of the famous emperor of Ancient Rome, Marcus Aurelius, who said: “When a bunch of known corrupt people unite against one man and spare no effort to ridicule him, blackmail him and attempt to assassinate his character, blindly follow that one man!”
This is why many Nigerians have blindly followed Peter Obi. In “Prometheus Unbound,” Heracles finally frees Prometheus from his chains. In this lyrical drama, Percy Bysshe Shelly chronicles Prometheus’ strike against oppression; his ultimate triumph over the tyranny and bigotry of the gods led by Zeus. I have no doubt that Nigeria’s Prometheus will be unbound one day. A thief can continue to enjoy his loot but, one day, the owner of the looted property will emerge to reclaim his goods. Nigeria remains our country. We shall never allow a few cabals to hijack it. We must take back our country.
Re: Dancing naked in market square
Igbokwe, this APC government is lucky because what Lai Mohammed dished out to the then PDP government under Jonathan has not been said to this incompetent wobbling APC government. The negatives of this APC government far outweigh the positives. The Nigerian people, under this wobbling APC government, are docile now. If not, there should have been more protests, like the one called ‘Occupy Nigeria,’ under Jonathan, initiated by this APC government, sponsored by Tinubu & Tunde Bakare as arrowheads. APC should bury its head in shame.
– Barry in Ogoniland, +234 803 435 6380
A cursory observation clearly indicates that the APC-led government and the Tinubu campaign council are now obsessed with Peter Obi since after the presidential election on daily basis unlike before the election. They no longer talk about Atiku and the PDP because in their genuine assessment, Peter Obi poses a greater danger to their apparently stolen crown. They must have studied the petitions filed by Atiku and Peter Obi at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal and realised that perhaps, Peter Obi’s legal team filed a more concrete and water-tight petition, hence the current panic mode in their camp. How could anyone accuse Peter Obi of treason or trying to incite a violent overthrow of govt? Is it the same Peter Obi even as a very young man in 2003, took resort to election petition tribunal to retrieve his stolen mandate as a governor when retrieving mandates through election tribunals seemed impossible in Nigeria? APC and Tinubu have hired over 50 SANs to defend their supposedly credible mandate. Only a bad product requires extra-ordinary marketing strategy to sell it.
– Ifeanyi, Owerri, +234 806 156 2735
Dear Casy, dancing naked in market square is a reflection of extreme mental disorder that is irreversible. A proverb has it that he who covets that which rightly is not his, attracts to himself mortal misfortune which rightly is not his. In the matter under reference, these people forcefully, willfully and with so much contemptuous indifference and hubris, stole an item of very high treasure, the MANDATE, from Nigerians via a sham, which, by their own unholy and voracious standard, they regard as 2023 elections. What followed next from Nigerians since then have been: (1) anger (2) resentment (3) revulsion (4) prayers, and (5) curses! The attendant effects on the target people are: (1) worries (2)restlessness (3) sleeplessness or insomnia, and (4) dancing naked in the market square. Barring Divine intervention, by the time ‘judicial merchandising’ ‘presumably’ comes into effect, whatever is left of the naked dance shall, unfortunately, be unleashed in the streets and highways because their goons shall, then, hold sway while the naked dancers hold the country by the jugular.
– Steve Okoye, Awka, 08036630731
Casmir, it is a well known fact that in Nigeria, all animals are equal, but, some are more equal than the others. Sometime ago, PMB, known then as Mr/retired general Buhari said “if the 2015 election was rigged in favour of Jonathan, that both the monkey and the baboon would be soaked in blood”. This was a call to his supporters to go on the path of violence rather than ‘go to court’. Was that not a call for insurrection? He was frustrated in the courts that they now recommend to Obi and Atiku! It is time for Lie-Lai Mohammed to stop dancing ‘break dance’ nakedly in the market square! He has unwittingly struggled to nail Obi & Datti who are gentlemen trying to rescue Nigeria from the jaws of usurpers and impostors like Tinubu & INEC. INEC & Lai now want us to believe that Nigeria has 37 states when a candidate fails to score 25% in FCT Abuja. But, it is 36 states when analysing Obi’s electoral performance; Obi won in 11 states and FCT Abuja! Abuja now mutates! Sometimes, it is regarded as a state and other times it is not a state. There can’t be two countries like Nigeria in the world!
– Mike, Mushin, +234 816 111 4572
One is shocked to the marrow that an obvious situation is downplayed while a heavy weather is being made out of a non-existent situation, just to divert the people’s attention from the stark realities that stare us in the face. And it is also difficult to fathom out why one who insists that he won the 25 February ‘23 Presidential Election and will prove it via his legal challenge is being labelled as a felon, and even to the extent of goading him to go on self-exile. Nigerians are too wise and smart to be railroaded by the actions of a few greedy and and unprincipled persons whose stock in trade is to be transiting from one government to another in search of food, and very unmindful of their past deeds and vocal statements. Never has it been this bad! Purported winners devising all odd means to achieve their 29 May Inauguration which they strongly believe is widely opposed, and may not be feasible. James Hadley Chase’s masterpiece ‘The Guilty Are Afraid’ perfectly captures the present oddities and unbelievable occurrences perpetrated by our known and unknown gunmen against the retrieval of the Obi/Datti stolen mandate.
– Edet Essien Esq., Cal. South, +234 810 809 5633
Dear Casmir, the first dividend of democracy is Civic right and the first Civic right is right to choice: choice of leaders, choice of career and choice of spouse. Most Nigerians are deprived of these and this is a rape of democracy. The judiciary is what is on trial.
– Cletus Frenchman, Enugu, +234 909 538 5215