In his poem, An Essay on Criticism, Alexander Pope, an English poet, gives us an eternal statement that has stood the test of time in a fast, continually changing world. “Good-nature and good-sense must ever join. To err is human; to forgive, divine,” writes Pope in his poem published in 1711.
Like you might have assumed in the past, for many, before a few minutes ago, this statement isn’t from the Bible or from a pastor, but hardly can anyone fault the premise on which it was based and its philosophical import. Pope, meanwhile, was just a layman who had neither the opportunity to attend Oxford nor Cambridge.
I have, however, been thinking lately that a few of our National Assembly members, who might have heard or read this statement countless times, might not understand its meaning and implication either. Former Edo State Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, a former labour activist, falls into this class of senators and lawmakers who believe that, due to their exalted positions as ‘distinguished senators’, they are not expected to admit making a mistake, no matter how intentional, and ask for forgiveness.
As one who has never been far away from the family compound of controversies since his days as the president of the Nigeria Labour Congress, the former governor has not stopped attacking the Senate or its leadership since he deliberately misrepresented the position of the red chamber’s probe into a few trillion of naira (very few) the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited failed or refused (or both) to remit into the federation account during tenure of the former NNPCL’s Group Chief Executive Officer, Mele Kyari. He had gone ahead to justify, on the floor of the Senate, why he lied on the position of the committee looking into the probe of the unremitted funds.
