Funmi Branco: Ogun Politics, Amosun And The Abuse Of Power
You do not have to be a literary mind to realize that power is a special kind of wine. It intoxicates and must be tempered by trials, tests and the keeping of focus. Raw power unmediated by checks and balances disrobes otherwise sane individuals from the commonality of human kindness. In the corridors of power many, forgetting that they are humans whose breath is completely at the mercy of their Creator, behave like the lords of time and circumstances. They look down on others as if they are of no consequence. As the Bard of Avon says through Brutus in Julius Caesar: “The abuse of greatness is when it disjoins remorse from power.”
If you have a friend who has not attained any position of power, that friend isn’t really your friend because you may not know his character. Most people hide their inner character and behavioral patterns while still searching for power. But as soon as they get that power, they become their real self. As John Dalberg-Acton, the 19th century English historian once famously said, “power tends to corrupt but absolute power corrupts absolutely’. Actually, the Bard of Avon provides a neat summation of the various categories of people who traverse the corridors of power: “Some are born great, some achieve greatness while some have greatness thrust upon them.”
The pages of history are replete with people who were never expected to be in the corridors of power and who mismanaged it so blatantly and invidiously, egged on by fawning felons. In our political environment, power and its mismanagement is a common phenomena, and it is in this regard that the macabre dance going on in the Gateway State invites commentary. Created in 1976, the state has seen seasons of power and its wielder. In 1999, there was Governor Olusegun Osoba who was only privileged to spend only a term, but whose legacy still remains till today. There was Governor Gbenga Daniel, a brilliant but brash leader who spent two terms and thereafter contended with the side effects of the arrogance of power: his successor made sure that he was a regular visitor in EFCC office and some of his properties were even confiscated. Humbled and chastised, he is now trying to get his acts together.
If you have a friend who has not attained any position of power, that friend isn’t really your friend because you may not know his character. Most people hide their inner character and behavioral patterns while still searching for power. But as soon as they get that power, they become their real self. As John Dalberg-Acton, the 19th century English historian once famously said, “power tends to corrupt but absolute power corrupts absolutely’. Actually, the Bard of Avon provides a neat summation of the various categories of people who traverse the corridors of power: “Some are born great, some achieve greatness while some have greatness thrust upon them.”
The pages of history are replete with people who were never expected to be in the corridors of power and who mismanaged it so blatantly and invidiously, egged on by fawning felons. In our political environment, power and its mismanagement is a common phenomena, and it is in this regard that the macabre dance going on in the Gateway State invites commentary. Created in 1976, the state has seen seasons of power and its wielder. In 1999, there was Governor Olusegun Osoba who was only privileged to spend only a term, but whose legacy still remains till today. There was Governor Gbenga Daniel, a brilliant but brash leader who spent two terms and thereafter contended with the side effects of the arrogance of power: his successor made sure that he was a regular visitor in EFCC office and some of his properties were even confiscated. Humbled and chastised, he is now trying to get his acts together.
