By Charles Okeibunor
I was almost lost in thoughts, till I found myself back where I started.
Just thinking back.
June 12, that one and only freest and fairest election that could have been a similitude of democracy defined.
A time in history when Nigerians trooped out enmasse, their choice trumping religion, politics, ethnicism or tribalism.
They owned their choice as they lined up to be physically counted in the option A4 model.
Their excitement was palpable as they gleefully sang in front of their televisions and radios like children… Chanting the melodious campaign jingle MKO MKO MKO, Abiola Abiola Abiola they were hyped to the Heavens as if to say this is it!
But this hope that was raised many thousand feet above sea levels crashed in one full swoop, it was dashed and shattered in broad day light.
There were no survivors. Men mourned, women mourned, children bewildered, the sun set at noon.
Could this be the reason why the pieces of democracy have been so difficult to pick up after that?
June 12 was like leading a woman in labour to the delivery room, while her neighbour’s waited for good news. Only to midwife her baby and gag the baby to suffocation before the mothers eyes!
How? How? Why? Why?
Unthinkable anguish, Painful, Numbing, thoughtless, tactless, Hobbesian, callous, cold, cruel, wicked, selfish, and what have you.
I know MKO was not a saint, but I praise him for not budging. It was better to die in detention than to live in bondage.
I am also glad IBB is alive. It is good he is alive to see how the seed he planted is growing.
Frankly, it doesent matter what kind of President Abiola would have become, as much as it mattered about what Nigeria would have become had the results been allowed to stand.
June 12 is bigger than MKO, it is the Civility to choose without bloodshed. It is the ability to be part of creating a future. It is a collective hope frittered away. A story of how a beacon of light became a candle in the wind.
Today, June 12 is not a good example because it never ‘was’, it is not even a scar, it is a festering wound that refuses to heal but suppurates with every election cycle.
Reminding us about a people that hope against hope.
Are we cursed or are we the cause?
June 12…
Charles Okeibunor
