Dr.Bukola Saraki, the President of the Senate, is not a
candidate in the next governorship election in Kwara
State, but it is his election. This is one election that
would determine his future and that of the Saraki
dynasty. There are about 35 governorship candidates
vying for the election including Abdulrasaq
Abdurrahman, the candidate of the All Peoples
Congress, APC, and Rasak Atunwa, the candidate of
the People’s Democratic Party, PDP. Both men were
Saraki’s men in the days of old. Now it is only Atunwa
of the PDP that is Saraki’s man.
Saraki wants to go back to the Senate where the
current Governor, Abdulfataa Ahmed is also aiming to
go. Both of them are running on the platform of the
PDP. In the last general election, both Saraki and his
governor were candidate of the APC. Now national
politics and the drums of ambition has steered Saraki
and his henchmen into a different course. His old
comrades are now his dedicated opponents. The
outcome of the coming election would prove whether
Saraki has made the right choice.
Saraki is an inheritor of a vast political empire with
deep tap roots. His father, Dr Olusola Saraki, was a
medical doctor who made good friends during his
practice in Lagos. He became wealthy and decided to
go back home through the route of politics. It was a
fortuitous decision which was to have great impact on
millions of people and the careers of his descendants.
He was elected into the Constituent Assembly from
Ilorin, a city his father had adopted as his hometown.
Saraki’s father was from Abeokuta, who after many
years in Ivory Coast, returned to Nigeria and settled
among the Oyo of Ilorin. His son was destined to
dominate the city no other personage has ever done
since soldiers, loyal to Malam Alimi, A Fulani peripatetic
priest and medicine man, staged a coup against Afonja
in 1837, igniting a Civil War that ultimately led to the
collapse of Oyo Empire and the annexation of Ilorin into
the Sokoto Caliphate. Alimi was originally an associate
of Afonja, the Aare Ona-Kakanfo of Oyo Empire and the
most senior of military commander of the Alaafin.
By the time Saraki was elected into the Constituent
Assembly in 1978, Sokoto Caliphate had become
history, but its impact remain portent and its influence
pervasive. He believed that destiny had placed him at a
vantage point, to bring a reconciliation between the
Yoruba and the Fulani (and their mostly Yoruba soldiers
and commanders) who had met on the battle fields
during the 19th Century. He wanted to be President
and flaunted his Arabic name, Abubakar, in the North
and reminded the Yoruba of the West that he was
Olusola. However the conservative leader of the North
would not fully trust this new entrant. They elected
Alhaji Aliyu Shehu Shagari from Sokoto as the
presidential candidate of the National Party of Nigeria,
NPN.
I remember Saraki now as the Leader of the Senate
during the Second Republic. I was the National
Assembly correspondent for the National Concord and
everyone knew Saraki as one of the most powerful
senators. He was a humble man, accessible, simple
and never impatient. Unlike some of the big men of that
era, his constituents and any other person could see
him at any time and without any appointment. You
could accost him anywhere to ask questions. He never
seemed capable of losing his temper or to be in too
much of a hurry. His affection for people was genuine
as he radiated confidence and grace. His people
adopted him as their own. He was not a man who was
afraid of a good fight. Saraki, the father Kwara State
politics had arrived.
The1983 general elections was to provide him with the
opportunity to test his muscle. He had fallen out with
Governor Adamu Attah whom he helped to installed in
office in 1979 when General Olusegun Obasanjo
handed over power to elected civilian leaders. Attah
may have calculated that Saraki had no choice but to
remain loyal to the NPN, but he miscalculated. During
the governorship election, he led the posse against
Attah by backing the candidate of the opposition Unity
Party of Nigeria, UPN, Chief Cornelius Adebayo, a
former lecturer who was Saraki’s colleague in the
Senate. Adebayo won. Nobody dare take Saraki for
granted again.
When Major-General Muhammadu Buhari seized power
on December 31, 1983, Saraki was one of the scores of
politicians arrested. He was thrown into prison and
spent many months at Kirikiri in Lagos. He was
accused of collecting heavy bribes from contractors.
When General Ibrahim Babangida toppled Buhari in
1983, Saraki was one of those politicians freed. Though
he appeared before the Justice Samson Uwaifo panel,
he was never tried for his alleged malfeasance.
Saraki became close to the military boys and forged a
special relationship with General Sani Abacha who
seized power in November 1993 from the Interim
Government of Chief Ernest Shonekan. Then Abacha
died and Saraki again re-emerged as the dominant
political force in Kwara politics during the Transition to
Civil Rule programme of General Abdulsalami
Abubakar. He ensured the victory of his candidate,
Admiral Mohammed Lawal, former military governor of
Ogun State, as the helmsman of Kwara State.
My friend and old classmate at the University of Lagos,
the late Wale Oladepo, was Lawal’s Commissioner for
Information. I visited Oladepo in early 1983 and he
said his oga was facing a tough battle from his former
mentor. By this time, Lawal was struggling for his
political life. Saraki, one of the founding fathers of the
All Peoples Party, APP, had made a strategic move that
left Lawal gasping for breath. He left the APP for Lawal
and pitched his tent with the powerful People’s
Democratic Party, PDP, and got his son, Bukola
Saraki, former managing director of the ill-fated
Societe-General Bank, installed in the precinct of Aso-
Rock Presidential Villa. In his fight against Lawal, he
had recruited a powerful ally, Chief Olusegun
Obasanjo, President of the Republic. The rest is
history.
Now history is beckoning against to give its verdict.
Since the family defeated Lawal in the epic battle of
2003, politics as the family business has been
prospering. Bukola Saraki had spent eight years as the
Governor and after that retired into the Senate where
he clinched the coveted seat as the President in a
classical coup against his party, the APC. Leading the
charge against him now In Kwara is Alhaji Lai
Mohammed, the Minister of Information and Culture
who knew the potency of the Saraki sting. He once
contested for the governorship seat and was worsted by
the Saraki machine. Now is another chance.
But for the crisis in the APC which made Saraki to
retrace his steps back into the PDP, this election would
have be a no-contest for him. With the formation of the
APC, most of his old political foes were now in the
same camp with him. Lawal was dead and so were
General Abdulkareem Adisa and General Tunde
Idiagbon, former Chief of Staff Supreme Headquarters.
General Abdullahi Mohammed, former Chief of Staff to
President Obasanjo, seems to have retired from active
politics. Brigadier General Theophilous Bamigboye,
former military administrator of Osun State, seems not
to gather enough steam for his ambition to become the
governor of Kwara State. Then the national crisis in the
APC rocked the boat.
For 40 years, the Saraki dynasty has proven its mettle
in peace and crisis. It has weathered turbulent weather
and occasional calm. It has exercised power and
influence in an unprecedented manner. It has amassed
a fortune and built for itself a formidable political empire
envied by foes and friends alike. The coming
governorship election would prove whether the Saraki
Dynasty is staying the course or like the great Titanic, it
is on its last voyage.
