By Ochereome Nnanna

NIGERIA is saddled with a number of problematic elders. These are people raised in the system by the system. They grew up and occupied so many enviable positions as youth. Now, they are in their late seventies and eighties. They are supposed to have vacated the stage for the generation of today to tackle today’s challenges with the vision and vigour of today’s people. But they do not have much chance because the people who stole their tomorrow are still on the stage, causing trouble and haunting the system like diabolical ghosts. Yet they are called: “elder statesmen”. The “elder” part is obvious. But the “statesmen aspect” is a dubious misnomer.

Of the lot, two-time Nigerian president, Olusegun Obasanjo is foremost. Others include Chief Edwin Kiagbodo Clark, self-acclaimed Ijaw leader and professional agent provocateur. Others include Professor Ango Abdullahi and former Governor of Kaduna State, Alhaji Lawal Kaita, both fire-eating evangelists for the return of power to Northern Nigeria by all means. The sound and fury of their rabble-rousing fills the Nigerian landscape with venom.

Before I continue, let me explain that we have PhD and PHD. PhD (Philosophiae Doctor, or Doctor of Philosophy) is the highest academic laurel obtained after completing education at the quaternary level. It is also awarded to persons for their original contributions to knowledge. Apart from Chief Clark being a lawyer, I am  unable to confirm if he is a PhD holder, and even if he is, that is irrelevant in the issue at hand today.

The PHD I am ascribing to this 87 year-old recently married elder is a street term you are all familiar with: Pull Him Down. It is more than a syndrome with EK. It is an obsession as well as a well perfected personal strategy for achieving his political goals and maintaining his political vineyard, which has been recording bumper harvests since his Ijaw kinsman, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, became the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The last time Chief Clark won any election was 31 years ago, when he was elected into the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Since then, he has not managed to get any of his cronies elected. But he has perfected a method of shooting down (or at least taking potshots) at people destined for election or appointment into high office if he does not like them. He has brought his propaganda tactics garnered as a former Federal Commissioner for Information to oil his ethnic-based political machine.

There is hardly a stakeholder in the system that has not gotten their share of Clark’s PHD vitriol. Samplers: when former Governor of Rivers State, Dr. Peter Odili seemed on the verge of a successful run for president in 2006, Clark started calling him an “Igbo man” who was usurping the South-South’s campaign for president. He split the South-South People’s Assembly (SSPA) into two and succeeded in persuading President Olusegun Obasanjo to avoid giving the Vice Presidential slot to Odili, an “Igbo man”; a campaign that resonated well with Obasanjo. He and the late Dr. Matthew Mbu, the then Chairman of the SSPA fought dirty until the latter passed on.

Clark fought the emergence of Dr.Emmanuel Uduaghan as Governor of Delta on ethnic grounds and continued to heckle Uduaghan’s mentor, former Governor James Ibori as a corrupt man until nemesis caught up with Ibori. In 2010, Clarked attacked the Igbo nation when a section of the Igbo elite was considering supporting the North president against Jonathan. Clark said the Igbo “had no electoral value”. But when the Igbos finally decided not to run for president or vice, but rather to close ranks and vote en masse for Jonathan, giving him more than giving him more than nine million out of the twenty million votes he scored to win the 2011 presidency, Clark made a volte-face and became a “friend” of the Igbos. He started recalling how Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe used to be the political hero of his people in the Warri area those days.

Clark has frequently tackled the North and their leaders since they started their effort to snatch their power back from Jonathan. He accuses them of financing Boko Haram. He has often taken on Obasanjo, calling him the “corrupt Nigerian” after Obasanjo’s recent open letter to President Jonathan. He turned on the Yorubas, reminding them that they have no leaders. Then, he took on Chief Bola Tinubu, taunting him to prove he is a blood son of the Tinubu family. He stopped short of saying Tinubu was not a Yoruba man. The objective was obviously to drive a wedge between him and people of the South West and their current political leader.

Clark’s most recent target is Chief Raymond Dokpesi, the Chairman of Daar Communications and proprietor of Africa Independent Television (AIT) and Ray Power FM. Dokpesi is being considered for appointment as the chief of Staff to President Jonathan after the recent forced resignation of Chief Mike Oghiadomhe. For Clark to hit out at  Dokpesi means the latter’s chances of nicking the job are very good. He is accusing Dokpesi of doubtful loyalty, since in 2010 he was backing former President Ibrahim Babangida against Jonathan.

However, Clark’s indisposition to Dokpesi’s appointment goes beyond looking out for Jonathan’s interests. It is squarely self-serving, as usual. Dokpesi was the Secretary of the SSPA when the late Mbu was its Chairman. Dokpesi was the engine room of that movement, which was created to build bridges between the South-South and South East, and from there to other parts of Nigeria to create a new Nigeria where the Southern Minorities would no longer be exploited and marginalised. SSPA was, in all truth, building up to back Odili for president, which the South East was very favourably disposed to due to Odili’s contiguous and consanguine identity to the two zones.

When Clark successfully persuaded Obasanjo to shunt aside Odili and settle for Jonathan, the SSPA led by Mbu and Dokpesi was mortally wounded. Clark declared victory, and has since appropriated the spoils of “war” to himself, his Ijaw kinsmen (as evident in their near-total sweep of South-South shares in the Jonathan government) and his hangers-on. Dopkesi as Jonathan’s Chief of Staff will stand in Clark’s “line-of-view” into Aso Villa. Clark would have none of that!

It is true that Dokpesi has once worked for those who wanted to unseat Jonathan. I don’t think that, in considering him as his COS, Jonathan or his eagle-eyed First Lady has forgotten that fact. In politics, there are no permanent enemies or friends. Jonathan is set for the 2015 re-election. He is looking for people who will help him get it. Perhaps, Dokpesi can pull in.