Letter to Mrs. Aisha Buhari [2] – Godwin Etakibuebu

By Godwin Etakibuebu

“ME’-NE, ME’-NE, TE’-KEL, U-PHAR’-SIN”. It is interpreted thus:

Mene – God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end

Tekel – You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting.

Peres – Your Kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians

Madam, above is not Urhobo language or its proverb but a verse taken from the Holy Bible book of Daniel 5:25. It is most likely to be Aramaic language; introduced by the Assyrian as the lingua franca to supplant Akkadian language, as the spoken language of the general population of both Assyrian and all over Mesopotamia. Permit me to tell you the story behind the quote before we go to its applicability on events of today’s Nigeria; where your most respected husband presides as Executive President.

Bel-shaz’-zar was the son of the King Neb-u-chad-nez’zar of Babylon the Great; a powerful Empire that ruled all over the World and he succeeded the father [Nebuchadnezzar] when he died as king over Babylon. In the euphoria of that success, he was carried away and started doing what annoyed the God of Heaven. In one of those festivities, a man’s finger [the King saw only finger of man – without seeing the man] wrote above quoted over the candlestick upon the plaister of the wall of the king’s palace.

The king was worried and he needed interpretation and the only person that could interpret it throughout the Kingdom was Daniel. Daniel was invited in by the King, and by the Spirit of God dwelling in Daniel, he interpreted it as reproduced above.

Madam, there is no gainsaying that the interpretation was worrisome to the King and all those that listened and it [interpretation] remained a lesson in perpetuity that no human being should play God. That very night Daniel interpreted the handwriting was the same night that King Bel-shaz’-zar was slain. The first lesson we must learn is that the King did not learn from history because if he has done, he would have escaped the catastrophe.

Obviously, he did not learn from the mistakes of his father; who was equally carried away by what he termed to be his personal achievement in creating the great Babylonian Empire, without giving God the glory. God punished him by turning him to animal, dwelling amongst beasts in the forest for seven years. His father; King Neb-u-chad-nez’zar, was equally warned by God in a dream, about the calamity that could come against every ruler who ascribed monopoly of wisdom to himself and refused to take advice from those He [God] planted around him. It was the same Daniel that also interpreted that dream to the father then.

Madam, l am going into this detail in relating this story and analyzing same because of your pedigree. Within the past two years, you have been able to prove that you hate injustice, double-dealing, fraudulent activities and other vices. You proved that courageously outstanding ability to be vocal in defending what is just and right. You have done this, not only at the risk of your matrimony, but that of your life because the few things you have voiced out publicly could cause unimaginable collateral damage to your mortal person.

I told you last week [in that first letter] that this exercise [writing to you] “is all about the salvation of your husband” and urge you to “treat most urgently”. The need for this observation and the urgent call for your action have not diminished. Instead, the challenge of rescuing your husband from the cabal we identified last week [in that letter] is becoming more tantamount on daily basis. Let us look at few of such events before we draw the curtain on this letter writing venture.

One, l told you last week that it is God, answering Nigerians prayer, that sustain your husband alive and l am not too sure that God showed this uncommon mercy for him to go for a second tenure. I am of the opinion that God preserved his life to finish this one tenure and retire home to Daura to live his life peacefully with you, the children and grandchildren. Ipso facto, “hold your husband and walk away” to Daura, in the language of Frank Edoho; that former MTN’s presenter of who wants to be a millionaire.

Two, l told you last week that those persons who want your husband to declare for a second tenure, under whatever guise, do not have the interest of Muhammadu Buhari at heart. Such persons, under whatever name; be it cabal, loyalists or Buharists, are embarking on such venture purely for their selfish interests and gains. They are exploiting the gains that the name Buhari can bring from the Nigeria national till. God forbid, if anything happens to your dear husband on the process of engaging in another rigorous campaign or in prosecuting the excruciating exercise of another four years in government, these people would be the first to say “his place, let another take”. You have the onerous responsibility to outwit them Madam.

Three, l told you last week how a good actor quits the stage when ovation is highest. Nobody would forget in hurry the ovation and goodwill across the Nigerian landscape that heralded your husband to power in 2015. “Sai Baba” was really meant to be “true father”. Today, that goodwill and accolade have been adequately squandered. The ovation that heralded him to the theatre stage is gone. Why can’t he leave the stage, at the end of this tenure, before the remnant of the ovation is given an inglorious burial? Madam, you have that God-given assignment, as his only and legitimate wife, to save your soul-mate please.

Four, l told you last week that all those pushing and shoving him for continuity are parasites plants and you know what that means in botany. The parasite comes on a very healthy three and within a few months, the host-three dies and the reason for this is nothing but the fact that the parasite feeds entirely on the nutrient of the mother-three. That is what all the members of the cabal are to your husband.

Five, l told you last week that these same people that want him to continue are the same people that have messed your husband up in these past three years, so to say. What Nigerians called President Buhari’s blunder since arriving the scene, may not really be what he designed to achieve. However, for different reasons, which included ill-health, over dependency on subordinates of shady characters and for not knowing that the buck stops on his table, as the 33rd President of the United States; Harry S Truman, rightfully expressed, my dear President Buhari has been made the fallen guy [or the sucker] by the cabal.

You are the only last person around this man [your husband] that is still standing. That must have been the reason why you are adorned with such level of wisdom, knowledge, understanding and bravery to speak out by your Creator. The Great and Wise Creator must have positioned you around him to be his messiah for this very crucial time in his life.

Madam, the Bible quoted in the beginning of this letter talked of God “weighing the performances of King Bel-shaz’-zar on scale and found it to be wanting” after He had numbered the days before deciding to take it [the kingdom] away. This is very vital a lesson in evaluation of kings and exercise of their performances. Your husband is a King over Nigeria; de-facto and de-jury, by God’s appointment. It stands therefore, that the same everlasting God that appointed him as President [King] over Nigeria “rules in affairs of men”, according to Daniel 4:17.

God; the Most High, keep a very close and keen supervision over all those he appointed as leaders and he brings them into accountability of their everyday performances. This is where and when he weighs their performances on His own scale. What is the lesson we can pull from this story?

Madam, let us evaluate a few things in this APC government, which unfortunately, your husband is heading.

Nigerians are not forgetting your audacious revelation that the money budgeted to the Aso Rock Clinic was not used for the purposes it was budgeted for as there were no Panadol, no Syringe in the Clinic while the X-Ray machine there was as dead as dodo. This was despite the Billion budgeted to the place. Has the President done anything about this confirmed revelation, coming from no other person but you, till date? Such display of corruption absolutism plays itself out on daily basis in President Buhari’s Nigeria.

Take a look at Abdulrasheed Maina, the alleged Pension thief. With all the scandal around and about him, which includes the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice; appointed by your husband, going to Court and obtaining an injunction against the Nigerian Senate not to probe the way the alleged thief was smuggled back into the Federal Civil Service while this alleged heinous crime is still hanging on him. Is Mr President not supposed to defend his integrity in fighting corruption [even if it is in pretense] in this matter?

Madam, his [your husband] Chief of Staff has been alleged of obtaining amount of money within the region of N500, 000,000 from MTN for some shady deals. Our President did not say a word about it till today. In the same vain, he defended astutely his former Secretary to the Government of the Federation who was alleged to have stolen money meant to bring succor to those internally displaced people in the North/East trouble, until the Vice President Committee nailed him.

Time shall fail me should l embark on chronology of corruption and nepotism cases taking place under your husband’s strict supervision in this exercise. Suffice to conclude that majority of Nigerians have lost confidence in his ability to deliver them from hell to paradise. He has nothing good to bring to the table anymore, so it seems.

They are saying therefore that “it is time for Baba to go and rest”. Complete the peoples’ clarion call please, as you take our beloved President away from the Villa to Daura in Katsina State, for a befitting retirement on 29 of May, 2019. God help you Madam.

Godwin Etakibuebu, a veteran journalist, wrote from Lagos.