Akunyili, Adedibu and the Police

Comfort Obi

I had made up my mind never to comment again on any issue concerning Chief Lamidi Adedibu. The way I see it, no number of commentaries makes any meaning. He cannot amend his ways. He is indispensable to politicians because he supplies them with thugs, so they protect him. The police are at his beck and call. Upon his appointment as the Oyo State Commissioner of Police, Prince Udom Ekpoudom had withdrawn the scores of policemen who follow some dignitaries around, including Adedibu. Everyone chuckled. And said: He is a new broom. He will soon know the terrain. So he withdrew Adedibu’s police guards. But 48 hours later, he reversed himself, and gave some reasons why he had to do that. That is how much influence Adedibu exercises in Oyo State. The police are afraid of him, as is everybody else. But I digress.
So, I had long decided not to bother about him. This explains why a couple of weeks ago when the Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Professor Dora Akunyili, cried out against Adedibu’s activities as it concerns her Agency, I felt it was fruitless to comment. I restrained myself from doing that even after reading Akunyili’s threat to pull out her staff and leave Ibadan people at Adedibu's mercy. I wanted to ask her to do just that. For, I have never seen a more lily-livered people than Ibadan people. Atimes, and it is very often, I wonder how such a civilised people would allow a barely literate old man to control their destiny. It is Adedibu who dictates who becomes the governor in the State. He decides who becomes what in Oyo State. All of them bow before him. My reasoning: If they want to stand-by and allow him to inflict them with death, why not? NAFDAC should let them.
Akunyili’s complains were strong. She said Adedibu was obstructing NAFDAC's activities. She gave two examples while reporting him to the Olubadan of Ibadan, Oba Samuel Odulana Odugbade I, and Governor Adebayo Alao-Akala of Oyo State. She said Adedibu’s thugs returned substandard spaghetti, macroni, vegetable oil and drugs, which NAFDAC had confiscated, to the markets on his orders. She said Adedibu’s thugs forcefully re-opened a fish warehouse which NAFDAC had closed down. Everybody knew that those Akunyili complained to were incapable of calling Adedibu to order, even though they promised to do just that. Akala, for example, would not dare. He would lose his job within months if he tries it. Indeed, Akala’s deputy had berated Akunyili publicly for “insulting” their Baba. As for the Oba, Adedibu does not even know if he exists. He is more powerful than the Oba.
So, it remains only the Federal Government, mercifully under a new President, Umaru Yar’Adua, who could call Adedibu to order, at least, as it concerns NAFDAC. So, we were all waiting for that. But the Oyo State Police Commissioner, Ekpoudom, has foreclosed that. He has declared Adedibu innocent of the allegations made by Akunyili. Which is why I am again commenting on Adedibu, inspite of my earlier decision never to. Ekpoudom says Akunyili’s allegations are unfounded. His words: “I wrote a letter to the NAFDAC office in the state (Oyo State) to state instances where Chief Adedibu had obstructed their activities and they cannot give a single instance.
“It might have happened in the past, but my command had not received any complaint from NAFDAC that any individual or group of people are disturbing their activities.”
Now, what is Ekpoudom talking about? Would Akunyili make allegations she is not sure of? She is not a politician, and will not play politics with her job. What will she gain by making false allegations against Adedibu? The CP says he wrote to the state office of NAFDAC. Why to the state office? Why not to Akunyili’s office. She was the one who made the allegation, not the state office. Given Adedibu’s reputation, did the CP expect the state office to give him any negative report on Adedibu? Which officer will sign that report? Will that officer stay in Ibadan after that or run away? Surely, if he needed answers and instances, the person to contact is Akunyili. And by the way, Akunyili didn’t say Adedibu personally took action. No, he never does. He uses his thugs. Which was what Akunyili said. The CP says he had received no complaints since his assumption of office from the state office of NAFDAC. He is not likely to. They don’t report to him. They report to Akunyili. But even then, what will come out of the report?
This is not the first time the police will be shamelessly exonerating Adedibu from alleged crimes. The other day in a mosque in Ibadan, as prayers were going on, some thugs identified as Adedibu’s hangers-on assaulted two prominent Ibadan chiefs. They snatched the official car of one, and parked it in Adedibu’s house. Three days after, the police told us they had no reason to prosecute Adedibu because they parked the car there without his knowledge! How possible was that? During the 2007 general elections, some sensitive INEC equipments meant for elections were found in Adedibu’s premises. INEC made that allegation public. But a few days later, the police told us Adedibu was ignorant of the presence of the machines in his premises. How is that possible?
For too long, this man has been endured and managed. Scores of people have been killed in Ibadan, allegedly by his thugs. Properties worth millions of naira had been destroyed, allegedly by his thugs. For how long will this continued? During former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s regime, Adedibu reigned supreme. Neither he nor the party chairman, Dr. Ahmadu Ali, who dubbed Adedibu the Garrison Commander whose words are law, could control him. Must this continue? Now is the time to call Adedibu to order. It is the place of President Umaru Yar’Adua to do so. Enough is enough.