Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, at the recent flag-off of Kugbo Bus Terminal in Abuja, prophesied that by the time President Tinubu leaves office “in the next seven years, Nigerians will not recognize their country”.
“I have no doubt that by the time the President is through with his tenure in the country seven years from today, many people will not recognize the FCT, they will not recognize Nigeria again.”
In Akpabio’s dreamy world, what this wonderful revelation means is that Tinubu’s regime would transform the nation to a point where the level of prosperity would be unimaginable. Simply put, Nigerians would experience El Dorado, a place of fabulous wealth and humongous richness.
Predictably, the former vice president, Atiku Abubakar’s Special Adviser on Media, Paul Ibe responded by saying that Tinubu has already made Nigeria unrecognizable!
Akpabio’s eulogies for President Tinubu bespeaks the Senate President’s infamous patronage of the president, his shortcomings notwithstanding. For a man that would have been a charming parliamentarian, the prophecy and other false praises before them almost makes him the president’s number one spokesman. Even in the face of suffocating hardship and hunger in the land, such encomium takes deceptive optimism to a realm beyond the incurable!
As hyperbolic and outlandish as the prophecy sounds, the harsh reality on ground today makes it look like the distinguished Senator sees Nigerians as little children who can believe anything they hear. At the risk of sounding pessimistic, the prophecy readily conjures a flip side of metaphysical dimension reminiscent of the prophecy of the Biblical witch, Endor.
According to the Hebrew Bible, the witch of Endor was a sorcerer consulted by King Saul of Israel to summon the spirit of the deceased Prophet Samuel. Saul was seeking spiritual advice on how his army could defeat the Philistines in battle, after prior attempts to consult God through sacred lots and other means failed. Whether it was actually the spirit of Prophet Samuel or that of a demon that was summoned by this witch, Saul had no way of knowing as he could only hear the voice without seeing the speaker. Unfortunately, it turned out that the witch summoned a ghost who delivered a prophecy of doom against Saul and his army. At the end, King Saul was roundly defeated by the Philistines. His sons were also killed.
As recorded somewhere in the Holy Book, Satan can transform himself into an angel of light. So, is it possible that like King Saul, what Akpabio saw in Abuja was actually the opposite of what he intended to see? By implication, his prophesy pre-supposes that a victory for Tinubu in the presidential election of 2027 is a foregone conclusion. That remains to be seen.
Across the globe, political actors, scientists and analysts have often devised different methods of predicting outcomes of the actions of political leaders. While some of these prediction methods are scientific, most of them are merely subjective and often prejudiced. One such effort in the United States called the “13 Keys to the White House” readily comes to mind. The Keys to the White House is a prediction system for determining the outcome of presidential elections. The system was developed in 1981 by American historian who goes by Allan Lichtman and Russia’s Vladimir Keilis-Brook.
It uses a 13-point checklist to assess the situation in the country ahead of the election. When five or fewer items on the checklist are false, the incumbent party is predicted to be the winner of the future election, but when six or more items on the checklist are false, the opposition party candidate is predicted to win.
From the content of the system, Lichtman said that voters select the next president, not based on electioneering campaign, but based on how they feel the incumbent party has governed the country. In other words, if the voters are satisfied with the governance of the country, they will re-elect the president or candidate of the incumbent party, but if dissatisfied, they will transfer the presidency to the opposition party.
Given the situation in Nigeria today, the ‘13 Keys to Power’ makes Akpabio’s 2027 forecast a false one. So if at the end of Tinubu’s first term and Akpabio’s prophecy fails to materialize, will the Senate President be charged for false prophecy? He might as well suffer the fate of King Saul under the spell of the witch of Endor?
That is the burden the Senator may have brought upon himself.
Akpabio should save his praises for such a time it will make sense, not when the economy is going downhill and insecurity is the order of the day.
He runs the risk of suffering the fate reserved for false prophets and he might be the one Nigerians may not be able to recognize as he might be consigned to the dustbin of history. As it stands, let us continue to pray for our dear country.
