EKITI ELECTIONS: PROFESSOR WHO BEHAVES LIKE A TOUT
Copied from the Facebook wall of Professor Pius Adesanmi
We must repeat this point: there can be no possible excuse or
justification for stupidity on the part of those who have read the big
books and whose minds have been humanized by the best thinkers in the
Humanities. Such people in our public life cannot expect to be
assessed like Evans Bipi or Ayodele Fayose. That is why I devoted two
column installments to Sanusi Lamido Sanusi's "shiki shiki ma mi owo
de" philosophy in the exercise of his duties as CBN governor. Now,
take your time and read this profile of another mind that has read the
proper books and is now behaving extremely stupidly:
============================================
Kayode Fayemi is a former Director of the Centre for Democracy &
Development, a research and training institution dedicated to the
study and promotion of democratic development, peace-building and
human security in Africa. Prior to his establishment of the Centre, he
worked as a lecturer, journalist, researcher and Strategy Development
adviser in Nigeria and the United Kingdom. He was Strategy Development
Adviser at London's City Challenge; research fellow at the African
Research & Information Bureau in London, UK, reporter with the
newspapers, The Guardian and City Tempo, editor of the political
monthly, Nigeria-Now, management consultant at Development and
Management Consultants and lecturer at the Police College in Sokoto,
Nigeria. As a prominent leader of the Nigerian opposition to military
rule in exile, he was responsible for the founding and management of
the opposition radios - Radio Freedom, Radio Democracy International &
Radio Kudirat and played a central role in the opposition's diplomatic
engagements in exile. An account of the process and roles played in
the setting up of Radio Kudirat may be found in Fayemi's book Out Of
The Shadows.
Amongst his numerous academic and public policy engagements at home
and abroad, Kayode Fayemi has lectured in Africa, Europe, the Americas
and Asia. He has also served as an adviser on transitional justice,
regional integration, constitutionalism, security sector reform and
civil-military relations issues to various governments,
inter-governmental institutions and development agencies. He was the
main technical adviser to Nigeria's Human Rights Violations
Investigation Commission (Oputa Panel), which investigated past abuses
and currently serves on the Presidential Implementation Committees on
Security Sector Reform, NEPAD and the Millennium Development Goals. He
was technical expert to the Economic Community of West African States
(ECOWAS) on small arms and light weapons and United Nations Economic
Commission of Africa on governance issues. He is also a member, Africa
Policy Advisory Panel of the British Government. At other times he has
served as a consultant to the OECD on Security Sector Reform and
chaired the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative's Committee of
Experts on developing guiding principles and mechanisms of
constitution making in Commonwealth Africa.
Kayode Fayemi is a Fellow of the Centre for Peace and Conflict
Studies, University of Ibadan, Adjunct Professor of Security Studies
at the African Centre for Strategic Studies, National Defense
University, Fort McNair, Washington, D.C., USA. He was also a Visiting
Professor in the African Studies Programme at Northwestern University,
Evanston, USA in 2004. Dr Fayemi serves on numerous Boards including
the Governing Board of the Open Society Justice Institute, Baobab for
Women's Human Rights, African Security Sector Network, and on the
Advisory Board of the Global Facilitation Network on Security Sector
Reform and on the Management Culture Board of the ECOWAS Secretariat.
Writings
He has written extensively on governance and democratisation,
civil-military relations and security sector issues in Africa. Among
his recent books are: Mercenaries: The African Security Dilemma (Pluto
Press, 2000); Deepening the Culture of Constitutionalism: The Role of
Regional Institutions in Constitutional Development in Africa (CDD,
2003), Security Sector Governance in Africa: A Handbook (edited with
Nicole Ball, CDD, 2004) and Out of the Shadows: Exile and the Struggle
for Freedom and Democracy in Nigeria (CDD, 2005).
==================================================
Governance and democracy are the keywords in this extensive and
unimpeachable intellectual trajectory. Yet, when it mattered most,
when the Nigerian political process badly needs evidence and
actualization of his democratic instincts rooted in a long history of
brilliant intellection, this foolish governor of Ekiti state goes and
prevents his under-read caterwauler of an opponent, Ayodele Fayose,
from using a stadium built with public funds. Is this not behaviour
one would rather have expected from a semi-garage tout like Fayose and
not from a sophisticated intellectual like Fayemi? Never mind that
this brazen illegality, this open rape of the democratic essence, has
been carried out in a way that insults the President. As we all know,
in Nigeria, two wrongs always make a third wrong inevitable. If the
President responds to this unwarranted insult by illegally blockading
Federal roads in Ekiti with Federal might now, these state-level
creators of the crisis will start screaming about democracy, playing
the victim. Is there something in the Nigeria air that makes readers
of every thinker from Aristotle to Zizek behave like pedestrian,
unsophisticated, and unread idiots once they get to public office?
This is another missed opportunity for APC. Every time they get an
opportunity to show the Nigerian people how exactly they are going to
be different from the PDP in substance and style, they mess up. Any
PDP charlatan of a governor would have done what Fayemi did. Where is
the difference?
We must repeat this point: there can be no possible excuse or
justification for stupidity on the part of those who have read the big
books and whose minds have been humanized by the best thinkers in the
Humanities. Such people in our public life cannot expect to be
assessed like Evans Bipi or Ayodele Fayose. That is why I devoted two
column installments to Sanusi Lamido Sanusi's "shiki shiki ma mi owo
de" philosophy in the exercise of his duties as CBN governor. Now,
take your time and read this profile of another mind that has read the
proper books and is now behaving extremely stupidly:
============================================
Kayode Fayemi is a former Director of the Centre for Democracy &
Development, a research and training institution dedicated to the
study and promotion of democratic development, peace-building and
human security in Africa. Prior to his establishment of the Centre, he
worked as a lecturer, journalist, researcher and Strategy Development
adviser in Nigeria and the United Kingdom. He was Strategy Development
Adviser at London's City Challenge; research fellow at the African
Research & Information Bureau in London, UK, reporter with the
newspapers, The Guardian and City Tempo, editor of the political
monthly, Nigeria-Now, management consultant at Development and
Management Consultants and lecturer at the Police College in Sokoto,
Nigeria. As a prominent leader of the Nigerian opposition to military
rule in exile, he was responsible for the founding and management of
the opposition radios - Radio Freedom, Radio Democracy International &
Radio Kudirat and played a central role in the opposition's diplomatic
engagements in exile. An account of the process and roles played in
the setting up of Radio Kudirat may be found in Fayemi's book Out Of
The Shadows.
Amongst his numerous academic and public policy engagements at home
and abroad, Kayode Fayemi has lectured in Africa, Europe, the Americas
and Asia. He has also served as an adviser on transitional justice,
regional integration, constitutionalism, security sector reform and
civil-military relations issues to various governments,
inter-governmental institutions and development agencies. He was the
main technical adviser to Nigeria's Human Rights Violations
Investigation Commission (Oputa Panel), which investigated past abuses
and currently serves on the Presidential Implementation Committees on
Security Sector Reform, NEPAD and the Millennium Development Goals. He
was technical expert to the Economic Community of West African States
(ECOWAS) on small arms and light weapons and United Nations Economic
Commission of Africa on governance issues. He is also a member, Africa
Policy Advisory Panel of the British Government. At other times he has
served as a consultant to the OECD on Security Sector Reform and
chaired the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative's Committee of
Experts on developing guiding principles and mechanisms of
constitution making in Commonwealth Africa.
Kayode Fayemi is a Fellow of the Centre for Peace and Conflict
Studies, University of Ibadan, Adjunct Professor of Security Studies
at the African Centre for Strategic Studies, National Defense
University, Fort McNair, Washington, D.C., USA. He was also a Visiting
Professor in the African Studies Programme at Northwestern University,
Evanston, USA in 2004. Dr Fayemi serves on numerous Boards including
the Governing Board of the Open Society Justice Institute, Baobab for
Women's Human Rights, African Security Sector Network, and on the
Advisory Board of the Global Facilitation Network on Security Sector
Reform and on the Management Culture Board of the ECOWAS Secretariat.
Writings
He has written extensively on governance and democratisation,
civil-military relations and security sector issues in Africa. Among
his recent books are: Mercenaries: The African Security Dilemma (Pluto
Press, 2000); Deepening the Culture of Constitutionalism: The Role of
Regional Institutions in Constitutional Development in Africa (CDD,
2003), Security Sector Governance in Africa: A Handbook (edited with
Nicole Ball, CDD, 2004) and Out of the Shadows: Exile and the Struggle
for Freedom and Democracy in Nigeria (CDD, 2005).
==================================================
Governance and democracy are the keywords in this extensive and
unimpeachable intellectual trajectory. Yet, when it mattered most,
when the Nigerian political process badly needs evidence and
actualization of his democratic instincts rooted in a long history of
brilliant intellection, this foolish governor of Ekiti state goes and
prevents his under-read caterwauler of an opponent, Ayodele Fayose,
from using a stadium built with public funds. Is this not behaviour
one would rather have expected from a semi-garage tout like Fayose and
not from a sophisticated intellectual like Fayemi? Never mind that
this brazen illegality, this open rape of the democratic essence, has
been carried out in a way that insults the President. As we all know,
in Nigeria, two wrongs always make a third wrong inevitable. If the
President responds to this unwarranted insult by illegally blockading
Federal roads in Ekiti with Federal might now, these state-level
creators of the crisis will start screaming about democracy, playing
the victim. Is there something in the Nigeria air that makes readers
of every thinker from Aristotle to Zizek behave like pedestrian,
unsophisticated, and unread idiots once they get to public office?
This is another missed opportunity for APC. Every time they get an
opportunity to show the Nigerian people how exactly they are going to
be different from the PDP in substance and style, they mess up. Any
PDP charlatan of a governor would have done what Fayemi did. Where is
the difference?
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