Jimi Agbaje: De-constructing an “Activist”

By Dapo Thomas

Anytime I think of Jimi Agbaje and his political trajectory, I marvel at the challenge of locating him in a functional context that can help in unlocking the complexity of his persona. No doubt, Agbaje carries the mien of a gentle­man, a sociable fine guy and an inscrutable individual with a persona that exudes mystery. This is where the confusion lies: When a man’s personality is wrapped in a mythical cul de sac, he automatically becomes a case study for character anal­ysis and his behavior a whirligig for theoretical interpretation. Ordinarily, this would have been an unnecessary exercise but for the fact that the man is seek­ing to be the governor of Lagos State, a strategic and the most populous state in Nigeria, it has become imperative to throw him into the public space for an engaging discourse. Since 2007, Agbaje has been featuring in the state’s gubernatorial contests. It is his democratic right to do so. No one can deny him this right.
First, let us discuss Agbaje the activist. Agbaje’s political career started in 1993 when he joined other angry citizens to protest the June 12 an­nulment. As a seasoned pharma­cist, he worked with other pro­fessionals like Pat Utomi, Billy Lawson, Hassan Odukale, Ashe Ighodalo and Tola Mobolurin. The agitation against the June 12 annulment was a national “col­labo” involving all segments of the society; the students, the ar­tisans, the civil servants, the pro­fessionals, the traders, the young, the old, the kids, the earthly hosts and even the heavenly hosts. All against one man called Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida.

But when the storm was over, some vanishing people among the elite in particular decided to use that epochal event to rebrand by calling themselves “activ­ists”, a title traditionally and un­derstandably hitherto used by journalists for only three people in the country namely Gani Fawehinmi, Beko Ransome-Kuti and Femi Falana (the last man standing). These three people were ruthlessly persecuted and crucified for having the cour­age to protest the tyranny of the military and for their pertinacious sacrifice to oppose government’s terrorism against its own people. So, when I hear Agbaje refer­ring to himself as an “activist”, I begin to wonder if this was not delusive self-glorification. It is a serious miscarriage of linguistic justice for him to equate himself with these three personages. In a piece I did some 16 years back titled: “Who is an activist?” I wrote inter alia, “While one is not saying that being shoved into jail or
detention was a comforting ex­perience or an interesting excur­sion but for God’s sake, when has detention become the only index of ideological commitment and conviction? My position is that it is not just enough to call yourself an activist because you were de­tained or jailed by Abacha whom, from empirical analysis and labo­ratory experimentation, was suf­fering from egregious lunacy and had an unprecedented fascination for savagery and debauchery”.

I wrote further: “These days every Tom, Dick and Harry likes to robe himself in the cassock of an activist and the surplice of a NADECO chieftain. What makes the entire scenario intrigu­ing and ridiculous is the fact that those who also embarked on bal­listic gyrations around Europe and America, and were busy doing international “fine bara” in the name of the struggle while many of us were roasting in Aba­cha’s hellish inferno, now have the temerity to parade themselves as activists and “NADECO abroad”. However, unfolding events have started exposing the fake NADECO abroad who on returning to Nigeria, began to fraternize with the remnants of the evil cabal. “(Sunday Con­cord, October 17, 1999, p.16).

I hope Agbaje was not calling himself an activist because he was the treasurer of Afenifere, a socio-political group formed and led by Pa Abraham Adesanya and co. to represent and protect the political interest of the Yoruba in the post-annulment and post-military power- sharing regime. How the position of ‘akapo’ now confers the toga of activism on our man is what I cannot under­stand.

When a politician who claims to be an activist or a progres­sive lacks a defining ideological prism, it creates the impression that the politician’s objective is how to secure an end without the slightest scruples for the means of securing that end. A man who started his political journey in the camp of the ‘activists’ or the ‘progressives’ and is about to end it in a Party that is threatened by national rejection and isolation deserves our sympathy as well as our contempt.

A politician whose politics is not inspired by any philosophi­cal thought; a politician whose politics is not influenced by any political order; a politician whose politics is bereft of principles and values; a politician whose politics is not ordered towards welfarism will end up becoming a misfit in government and may also end up disrupting the legacy of good governance already established by the three visionary leaders that earlier ruled the state.

When Lateef Jakande ruled Lagos state, he cloned a new political order architectured on populism. When Bola Tinubu led the state, he elevated gov­ernance, scaffolding and con­structing it on progressivism and when Fashola ran the state, he evolved a new social paradigm and political thought, anchoring governance on ‘ elitemassism’, an uncommon philosophy that rhapsodizes both the elite and the masses as beneficiaries of gov­ernment policies and programs. It is therefore not a conjecture that Akin Ambode who spent 27 years of his life as a civil servant in Lagos state, being a direct cul­tural descendant of this political lineage whose entire professional life-having worked under at least two of them-has been molded by the vision of these men, will be a better leader to be trusted with power.

Assuming but not conceding that Agbaje is a committed pro­gressive, it will surely be difficult for him to operate or function effectively in the PDP, a party whose philosophy is incompat­ible with his ideological belief. This was the same problem that Sir Michael Otedola faced when he was the governor of Lagos state. Baba Otedola was a philan­thropist and a welfarist par excel­lence but his party, the National Republican Convention (NRC) was nothing near this. Otedola was therefore constrained by structural fundamentals and ideo­logical impediments that frus­trated his welfarist programme for the state. With due respect to the dead, the NRC under Otedola left a zero-legacy in Lagos State.

Some analysts, including my friend Segun Ayobolu, have argued intensely that the ideolo­gies of the two dominant parties namely PDP and APC are con­ceptually not dissimilar. I want to dissociate myself from this general disquisition. Though one may argue that there are some theoretical lacunae in the APC manifesto, this mis-packaging is not sufficient to dismiss the con­ceptual objective of the party to guarantee the people of this coun­try a welfarist agenda that is be­ing pursued with vigor, commit­ment and zeal. What is so glaring is that even if the PDP presents a welfarist manifesto to the nation as its political creed, the failure of the party at all levels is a testa­ment to its conceptual dishonesty. It is this kind of incorrect analysis that has provided an alibi for fake progressives to seek shelter and hibernation in every party using this as an excuse to justify their defection from one party to the other.

Agbaje’s movement from Afenifere (not a political party) to AC, later to DPA and now to PDP has shown that he is a poli­tician seeking power without a doctrinal conviction about what to use the power for. One may therefore not be wrong to be­lieve that Agbaje only wants to become a governor for profile ornamentation and status con­solidation. When he defected from AC to DPA in 2007 because of the choice of BRF as the pre­ferred and favored candidate of the AC, some of us thought he would soon return to the progres­sives fold but his present status as the PDP gubernatorial candidate in Lagos State has foreclosed the possibility of an ideological re­treat. Defection is a reflection of political mercantilism and those who keep vending around po­litical parties are desperados that lack the temperament for politi­cal cooperation and tolerance as well as the moral capacity for competitive engagement. Defect­ing from a progressive party like APC to a
deficit-ridden party like PDP particularly one provoked by selection disagreement, attests to Agbaje’s lack of commitment to his political creed. A man who is ready to commit ideological suicide in order to secure power should never be trusted with the security of his citizens. When it was convenient for Agbaje to fraternize with Bode George and Ogunlewe in order to deal with Musiliu Obanikoro, he did so with frenetic jubilation. Again, when it became conveni­ent for Agbaje to reconcile with Obanikoro on the prompting of President Goodluck Jonathan, he did not hesitate to leave his two godfathers in the cold. Agbaje’s public reconciliation with Oban­ikoro gave Koro the last laugh over Bode George and Ogun­lewe who felt humiliated by this abandonment. How then can the electorate trust a politician who places political expediency above fraternal allegiance?

When people say Agbaje is a gentleman I never disagree be­cause I know he is. But I always ask them the question: is Ambode a thug? A young man who rose to the position of a state permanent secretary and Accountant-Gener­al in a very competitive civil ser­vice like the one in Lagos State based on a profile of performance that is uncharacteristically fault­less and flawless, should natural­ly be perceived as a hardworking gentleman that has focus, class and dignified image.

Besides, electoral contest is not determined by sentimental perception and garnished image laundering. Now that we have two gentlemen vying for the same seat, the one whose party provides a platform for the poor to enhance their material security should be rated better in terms of political value. The general good of the people should not be sacri­ficed on the altar of sentimental­ity. I need to warn strongly that transferring power from a pro­gressive lineage to the clan of the bandits entails an inherent danger of turning Lagos to a rent-seeking society where the bandits are des­perate to capture power so that specific revenue stream could be appropriated for private use thus guaranteeing their indulgence in eternal Epucurian revelry.




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