Fayemi Beyond the Fiction: A Necessary Response
By Kayode Olasekun
The recent article titled “Fayemi’s Karma Arrived Sooner Than Anyone Envisaged” reads less like political analysis and more like a carefully curated exercise in bitterness, selective memory, and historical revisionism. While criticism is legitimate in a democracy, deliberate attempts to reduce the political journey of Dr. Kayode Fayemi to a caricature of ingratitude and betrayal deserve a measured but firm response.
First, it is important to state clearly that Dr. Fayemi has never denied the historic role played by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in Nigeria’s pro-democracy struggle or in the evolution of progressive politics in the Fourth Republic. Those contributions are matters of public record and should remain respected. However, acknowledging another man’s influence does not require the permanent surrender of one’s individuality, intellect, ambition or political agency.The dangerous logic underpinning the article is that anyone who once benefited from political support forfeits the right to independent thought forever. That is not democracy; that is feudalism.
Dr. Fayemi’s rise cannot honestly be explained merely as a gift handed to him by another politician. Before elective office, Fayemi had already established himself internationally as a respected scholar, democracy advocate, policy intellectual, and human rights activist. His role in the struggle against military dictatorship, particularly during the dark years after June 12, was neither decorative nor accidental. He earned his place in Nigeria’s democratic evolution through sacrifice, intellect, and consistency.To suggest that Fayemi became governor solely because of one man’s benevolence is unfair both to him and to the people of Ekiti State who voted for him.
