Senator Elisha Abbo, representing Adamawa North
Let me state from the outset that I am writing this column and sending it to my editor well before my submission deadline.
What this means is simply that my patience to tarry a little while before making one or two pretty critical remarks concerning critical happenings that have been trending in our media for some-time now may not be as I really wished to make them. What these further means is that my observations may have been out of currency or out of time by the time you are reading my utterances now.
To take care of my sojourn ahead of time I will merely try as much as possible to ask critical questions upfront, as my American friends might put it. I hope, however, that my upfront questions and remarks will circulate current interests in your critical imaginations. (By the way, my not tarrying my column till my submission-time has something pleasant about it, but let it be.)
What are the pretty critical happenings? Or what is the critical happening that should gain or that is gaining my attention now?
Let me begin with the sex-toys shop misadventure – for want of a better term – to describe what one Elijah Abbo did recently, what one Elijah Abbo, who is supposed to be a gentleman of our country, did recently in public to put himself, our senate, his senatorial district and state of origin in bad light.
He recently, allegedly, won a senatorial election from his senatorial district in Adamawa State. It was said, again, allegedly, that he is the youngest senator in our new senate. Is this the reason, or was this the reason, why he went to a sex-toys shop allegedly to fight, or, to beat up a woman, a nursing mother, to boot?
Well, well, well, I wanted to make a case for him on the basis of some questionable innate nature that must have possessed him beyond measure on the occasion of his alleged misadventure. But I wanted to wait patiently before doing so. I wanted perfectly or near perfectly to understand the happenstance that compelled him to do what he allegedly did. I did not want to be seen as a hasty comforter or a hasty momus under the spell of Momus, the god of blame and ridicule, in Greek Mythology.
After what I saw of Elijah Abbo in the inaugural meeting he had with the senators who were appointed by the new senate president Mr. Lawan to investigate Elijah Abbo’s allegedly ridiculous public conduct in the aforesaid sex-toys shop, I want to believe that the young man is nothing short of being called a curmudgeon. His response to Senator Mrs. Remi Tinubu’s pertinently innocuous and innocuously pertinent remarks bewildered me.
Senator Mrs. Tinubu, a member (presumably the sole female member), of the investigative committee was on point when she asked the questions she asked and when she made the comments she made. Was Elijah Abbo at that material time of his appearance before the Senator Dr. Sam Egwu Investigative Committee suffering from a mood disorder? What made the female senator’s legitimate caution to him a threat which he responded to the way he did?
Senator Mrs. Tinubu’s observation that an improper behaviour or un-becoming conduct that the young fellow might place before the senate’s investigative committee could earn him a suspension was, in my view, not in any way a threat. It was to sober and help him. It was not to endanger him.
Indeed it was to sober his mind that must no longer be intoxicated by the fumes of anger. And the JJC of a senator even had the temerity and audacity to refer to Senator Dr. Sam Egwu, Senator Mrs. Tinubu and the other senators in the committee as his colleagues? Yes, they may be his fellow senators, but they are by far his very senior fellow senators or very senior colleagues to whom he must defer regardless of his party affiliation (without hurting his party.)
What experience does he have in life or about life? There are senators and there are senators. Or am I wrong? Does the Nigerian senate not respect hierarchy and seniority – age-wise, wealth-of-experience-wise and in other pertinent respects? Abi our senate nor know wetin we dey call monkey by grade for Delta and the Edo States of ogbologbos wey know say ogbologbo pass ogbologbo? Any person who cannot be counseled, as Mrs. Tinubu tried to make the curmudgeon understand, cannot be helped. Good company and good discourse provide a firm link between our emotions and our politics. Clearly, they are the sinews of virtuous politics. I say this regardless of anyone’s party affiliation. Am I wrong?
Are we not now understanding why the Adamawa man behaved the way he behaved in a sex-toys shop? The man, by his conduct, attitude and disrespect to Senator Mrs. Tinubu and Senator Sam Egwu and company cannot but be seen as an un-good foreigner in our senate. Who disagrees? Will I be off the poetic pulse of my imagination if I refer to Elijah Abbo as merely a foreigner, a barbarian, on the loose in our senate museum?
Elijah Abbo says he is in court to argue against the charge against him. For this reason I will refrain from asking some legalistic questions even though I nor be lawyer. But I get common sense wey many, many lawyers nor get and nor go ever get. Believe me, yours sincerely.
In any case, I wish Elijah Abbo well as he mooches in court. By the way, the questions that I have raised have made it impossible for me to refer to Elijah Abbo as Mr. Elijah Abbo. The prefix Mr. that is placed before a person’s name is a title for a gentleman. Elijah Abbo is not a gentleman. If he doubts me he should consult a dictionary for the meaning and true meaning of a gentleman who deserves the Mr. title before his name.
By the way – this fine phrase again -, what did he go to do in a sex-toys shop? What did he need sex-toys for in this season of alleged sexual rapes allegedly engaged in by pastors and pastors in the Church of Christ (or in the lavishly roomy Body of Christ)? This is a critical issue, and questions that I wanted to allocate to them, and those accused and their accusers should correctly and rightly be allowed to soar and sojourn as they please till another time. Or is that not so?
Afejuku can be reached via 08055213059
guardian
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