By Duke of Shomolu
With glib intelligence, he weaves sweet anecdotes around his audiences leaving them with a feel-good feeling with no real lesson learnt while meandering through a field of landmines so expertly that he comes off with no injuries
It is no wonder that the brilliant Prof is usually the go-to person for such sensitive events like the very recent IBB Book Launch
This was not going to be an easy task. The good professor cannot feign ignorance at the simmering anger Nigerians have felt on the issue of June 12, its architect and its continued negative effect on the polity.
A normal reviewer would have been very cautious in accepting the assessment, but not for sleek-tongued Yemo.
He jumped at the assignment like fish to water and delivered one of the most meaningless, but sweet-laced speeches which made his audience laugh and give him an ovation when he finished
Yemo has made a career in this genre of public speaking. His days as an ineffective Vice President saw him junket around the speaking circuits, delivering very beautiful speeches filled with brilliant anecdotes, spiced with well-delivered jokes and delivered with the smoothness of a Las Vegas playboy.
As he went about his business, the economy was collapsing, insecurity was on the rise, and everything and anything that could go wrong went wrong, but still, he delivered speeches all over the country, making us laugh to the annoyance of comedians and motivational speakers whose main turf he was encroaching on.
So, who was the best person to review such a vile book?
A book that heaped insults on Nigerians especially the ones who lost their lives in the struggle of which he and his co-travellers were direct beneficiaries
Prof Yemo came highly recommended – a former Vice President, a Yoruba man, an eloquent speaker and a very brilliant man. He was the Event planner”s messiah
And he delivered. He took the podium and saw a bunch of contradictions seated in front of him and the Cicero of Ikenne or wherever he comes from went to work
He first defined his thrust – In Nigeria, there are no permanent… As a justification for what he was about to say.
IBB installed Buhari and overthrew him. He cancelled on June 12, and Tinubu protested and was jailed. Today, Tinubu is here celebrating with his erstwhile tormentor…
The hall went into raucous laughter, and the master had delivered once again.
The hall had missed the underlying message in that speech – self-interest and not abiding ideology guides our leaders.
Someone overthrew you, jailed you and thirty years after, you are smiling with him and donating billions as he launches a book with no real meaning to the Nigerian on the street.
Will we say Yemo knew what he was doing? Would we say he was actually poking them with sarcasm on an assignment he could not avoid?
My people, there is nothing in his career pedigree that suggests this as he has built a career in being politically slippery.
He is so sleek that you cannot hold him down to anything and this is why despite all those years in politics he could not build a base leading to a humiliating crushing defeat at the Presidential primaries, the worst for a sitting Vice President
His performance that day showed that he had not learnt anything as he spoke to the audience and not to Nigerians
He didn’t seem to care about posterity cos there was nothing in that beautiful speech that took IBB to task, instead of asking him pointed questions about June 12, SAP or any of the many controversies that followed that ones foray in leadership, he just resigned himself to making the people enjoy themselves like the master comedian Alibaba would do
Would it have been too much if he reminded IBB of Fajuyi, who asked to be killed with his principal as against his own case of annulling an election cos ‘he would have been killed’?
Would it have been too much to remind IBB that, as a General, he was not supposed to ‘step aside’ in war? But the right thing which was to give Nigerians their true desire.
Instead, Yemo used the opportunity of this platform to deliver sweet sonatas like a Grammy award winning artist celebrating a win.
This character will not have a scene in my Play except in a scene where he is being reported to Oludumare for misusing the immense brilliance he was bestowed with to the detriment of the people and to the self-serving benefits of his masters.
Yemo will never have a stage play, even if he comes to beat me.
He should just come and beat me, Jeje
Thanks
Duke of Shomolu