“Bukola you made me cry today after all I did for you as a son that I love so much you will be disgraced out of this game of politics except if am not your father”.
Saraki’s political dynasty in Kwara
The Saraki’s Dynasty is a political dynasty which had it origin in Ilorin, Kwara state and Dr. Abubakar Olusola Saraki is the founder. Olusola Saraki first ventured into politics in 1964, contested election for parliamentary election for Ilorin as an independent candidate, but lost. 14 years after he lost his first election, Saraki returned back to politics in 1977 when he was elected as a member of constituent Assembly that produced the 1979 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
In establishing what is today known as the Saraki’s dynasty, Olusola Saraki after himself supported Alhaji Adamu Atta who came from the minority ethnic group in his bid to become the first civilian Governor in Kwara state in 1979, the support he provided paid off as Atta emerges Governor. In 1983, Cornelius Olatunji Adebayo through Olusola Saraki’s support became the second civilian governor of the state.
Saraki nominated Shaba Lafiaji in 1992 and he won the governorship under General Ibrahim Babangida’s regime, before the taken over by General Sani Abacha in 1993.
Also, upon returning to civilian rule in 1999 after the demise of General Sani Abacha, Saraki anointed Late Admiral Mohammed Alabi Lawal who became the Governor under the platform of APP where Saraki was a member of the Board of Trustee.
Having gone on loggerhead with Lawal, Saraki decamped from ANPP to PDP and nominated his biological son Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki to become the Governor in 2003, Saraki’s son emerges against the incumbent Governor.
Transition in Power
In 2011, things fell apart between father and son, as both has divergent interest on who is to lead state in that year’s governorship election. The senior Saraki lead his daughter, Gbemi Saraki to depart the PDP to a new platform (ACPN) with no structure to contest for the governorship position, while his son anointed his own candidate and remain at the PDP. At the conclusion of the election, Alh Abdulfatah Ahmed emerged as executive Governor, which shows the end of the Olusola Saraki’s era, thereby placing Bukola Saraki as the new determinant factor in the Kwara polity.
The outcome of the new political regime did not go down well with the senior Saraki, and was reported to have placed curse on his son who is the current Senate President.
In some quarters in Ilorin, it has been repeatedly whispered that his father was so pained about the treachery of his son that he laid a curse on Senator Bukola Saraki that he (Bukola) would also meet his own waterloo in opprobrium. But treachery in the Yorubaland of Kwara is nothing new. It started in 1817, when Aare-Ona Kakanfo Afonja, seceded Ilorin from the control of Alaafin Aole (sometimes written as Awole) who also put a curse on Afonja just the way Oloye Sola Saraki put a curse on Senator Bukola Saraki. When Afonja was murdered six years after by his Fulani ally, Alim al- Salih (also known as Shehu Alimi) in 1823, Jagunjagun Solagberu, another Yoruba war General who was a traitorous co-conspirator with Field Marshal Afonja against the Alaafin Awole and Oyo kingdom became a victim of assassination by Alimi’s son to give complete control of a part of Yoruba land to the Fulanis.
This was the year, according to a Hugh Clapperton 1929 Journal, when Ilorin became part of the Sokoto Caliphate, as a result of this assassination of Jagunjagun Solagberu. The belated effort of Alaafin Majotu who succeeded Alaafin Aole to seek the help of the British and Oba of Benin to retrieve Ilorin from the non-native Fulani impostors came to naught. Ilorin later served as the launching pad of the Fulani imperialism against the Yoruba kingdoms until it was effectively repelled in 1840 at Oshogbo. The betrayal of Sola Saraki by his son, Bukola is only a manifestation of an odious practice that has become a character of politics in Yorubaland of Kwara State.
Now, long after the father is gone, the curses have started manifesting in his life.
Although Bukola Saraki is a former two- term governor and current senate president, he has continued to live in infamy and opprobrium for as long as anybody can remember.
Senator Bukola Saraki is battling heavily to save his face at the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT).
Bukola Saraki is being tried by the CCT for false declaration of asset, in forms he filed before the Code of Conduct Bureau while he was governor of Kwara state.
He is the one who has been accused of stealing Societe Generale Bank out of existence in Nigeria.
He is the same person who cannot explain the source of his wealth, including his wife and children cannot explain the sources of their stupendous wealth.
He is the one who imported a Range Rover into the country and tried to avoid paying duties on it.
He has also being accused of failing to complete the Mokwa-Jebba road contract.
He was also said to have stabbed Goodluck Jonathan in the back and caused PDP to lose power.
As if this is not enough, he is said to have cheated the APC out of the Senate’s Number 2 position which he gave out to the opposition PDP.
He is same person with one of his legs in the APC and the other in the so-called nPDP.
At the core of the call to impeach the country’s President who is from his own party is Senator Bukola Saraki.
He has also abused his own office and power by inviting the IGP, CG [customs], and Ministers for dressing-downs each time they don’t accede to his diabolical and corrupt plans.
Currently, he has been fingered by a criminal gang that killed 33 people, nine police officers and robbed six banks in Offa, Kwara state all in one day as their benefactor.
The present troubles of the former Governor of Kwara State now trying to hold on to his position as the President of the Nigerian Senate has stirred the hornets’ nest of those seeking to disentangle the Kwaran politics from the stranglehold of the servitude, subjugation and kleptomania that Bukola Saraki and his family represents, reportedly on behalf of those who are regarded as “neo -colonialists” in Kwara.
It is not clear how the present legal imbroglio would affect the struggles of the freedom fighters who are sensing an opportunity in the corruption war that seems about to engulf the “godfather” of Kwara politics.
The “freedom fighters” who are presently lamenting the absence of a powerful political figure to champion their course believed that they would not remain perpetually in servitude. They are expressing the belief that the lessons of history had insisted that “the battle for freedom is never done and its field is never quiet.”
Will this supposed cursed placed on the Senator Bukola Saraki, by his father end the long reign of Saraki’s dynasty in Kwara State? Time will tell.
