Aside Alhaja Hauwa’s remarriage debacle, there’s virtually no news story hotter than Saraki- Leah philanthropic gestures.
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The outgoing Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki defied the bookmakers by pledging his severance allowance to the Trust fund for Leah Sharibu and some other two victims of insurgency which has assumed the chiefly phenomenon in the nation’s list of insecurities.
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Perhaps due to the controversial personality of Saraki in the media world as a result of several unpalatable antecedents, the gestures have been demonised, misrepresented and even disparaged by bitter few.
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These moral armies are divided into two group; the Saraki is a devil mischief makers who up till this moment are still blinded to the fact that the devil is not always bad. In fact, goodness has no identified giver. It’s Providence. Anyone may choose to be good at any point in time. The other side comprises of bitter Kwarans who had never seen anything good in the man. As expected, these groups had come together to show contempt and disdains in the open. Misguided exercise.
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I found it worrisome that people could abhor so much hatred for the other person. That Saraki can never do anything good to some people’s admiration show clear hatred. It’s not criticism when you fail to commend but denigrate an act supposedly remarkable. It’s nothing but cynicism. And what brings about that is a tendency to allow emotions override reasoning. This is what happens most time when we see Politics at the expense of Humanity. That Saraki did such a thing should not attract denigration even if not your praises.
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The other warlords are the tireless Kwara Social media Oloyinbos. They must still be feeling so baleful to the man who held the state by the jugular for 16-good-years. However, the wise should know when to let go of the past to chat a productive present. Anyone still abhorring resentment does that at a personal cost. Saraki has been defeated politically. Even at that, politics was never about denigration. I am surprised people would still be demanding for his head with such vigour.
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It’s brazenly unpatriotic and chronically selfish for anyone to be calling out Saraki for choosing to remember Leah Sharibu at the expense of Kwara people. No doubts he’s from Kwara state, but he’s a Nigerian first. Saraki just finished service as the nation’s Senate President. By such Providence, he has become an elder statesman who is required to put the unity and oneness of Nigeria in the frontburner. That he chose Leah Sharibu and two others deserves no condemnation of any sort except from ethnic warlords and religious jingoist.
I am reknowned as a very fierce critics of the outgoing Senate President. Time and over again have seen him received my hammer on his controversial head. Yet, there was never a time he needed to be commended I denied him the grace. That’s wiseness. That’s being a critic. And not a cynic. This should be the only way of engaging the leaders across Nigeria. Perhaps we needed to know the difference between engagement and discouragement. Mayhap the Nigeria critics definition of criticism is attacks and all infectives. It’s wrong.
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There’s no total devil in human beings. There’s a reason no one’s identified and named Devil after Shaytan. We could, out of emotions, and exigencies of time, consider some people as Lucifer’s protégé, but it doesn’t invalidate their humanness. These people are good to some people too. It’s all about perception. However, being good has no second meaning. Goodness is goodness. This time Saraki did well if only you could see without log of tears in your eyes.
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Could you mean Leah is no human deserving of Saraki’s philanthropy?
Did you mean a Christian victim cannot be favoured by a Muslim leader?
Could you mean to say he couldn’t decide what to do with personal money?
Could you mean there are victims of insurgency in Kwara State?
Could you mean insurgency victims in other states do not deserve help and pity because they are not Kwaran?
Could this be pettiness, shallowness or backward ethnic mentality at play?
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Saraki is an adult with right and privilege to make informed personal decision. As an outgoing SP, the gesture to use his severance allowance to help the family of the kidnapped teenagers is remarkably noble. That some people are unrelenting in relating Politics to everything, even humanity, speaks of the decadence of intelligence in Nigerian youth ranks. That there are in fact, some ethnocentric vuvuzelas, lampooning Saraki for not bringing such gesture “home” shows that Nigeria has a long way to go to make it accorded proper recognition and respect as the ultimate home.
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I would admonish that Saraki should be taken up on other burning issues aside this. If there’s anything, Nigerians should prevail on others to toe this line. It’s no news that the parting gifts is paltry to any Nigerian Senator. But how many ever thought it well to give to others in the same vein? It may not necessarily be given out financially but maybe used to do some other things, say a public project. Yet, this is even if they wish. This is why a willing man like Saraki shouldn’t be discouraged.
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Saraki-Leah gestures lacks any basis for your condemnation and criminalisation spree.