PitObi: A Socialist, A Revolutionist Or A Reformer? -By Richard Odusanya

A socialist is someone who practices or supports socialism, which is an ideology or system based on the collective, public ownership and control of the resources used to make and distribute goods or provide services. Socialism is a rich tradition of political thought and practice, the history of which contains a vast number of views and theories, often differing in many of their conceptual, empirical, and normative commitments. Socialist politics has been both internationalist and nationalist; organised through political parties and opposed to party politics; at times overlapping with trade unions and at other times independent and critical of them, and present in both industrialised and developing nations.

Whereas, a revolutionist is someone who wants to change the world — not just sitting around talking about it, but actually doing something to bring about change. Like its synonyms revolutionary and radical, a revolutionist is someone who questions authority, maybe by taking part in a demonstration to protest a government policy or by otherwise pointing out thing that he or she believes is wrong with society — then acting to try to fix it. Peter Obi was not one that has ever been identified by revolutionary tendencies.

Furthermore, a revolutionary person fearlessly advocates radical change. Revolutionary people and ideas challenge the status quo and might be violent or willing to upset the natural order to achieve their goals. You don’t need to be violent to be revolutionary, just ask Gandhi and Rev. Martin Luther King. You don’t even need to be political. Alexander McQueen, John Lennon, and Picasso could tell you that. Peter Obi was never part of any revolutionary movement that I know of, rather he was on bed with those he tried effortlessly to distant himself from.

On the other hand, a reformism is a political doctrine advocating the reform of an existing system or institution instead of its abolition and replacement. Within the socialist movement, reformism is the view that gradual changes through existing institutions can eventually lead to fundamental changes in a society’s political and economic systems. Operating from within this framework, reformist movements were characterized by intellectual and structural ambivalence

Interestingly, reformism as a political tendency and hypothesis of social change grew out of opposition to revolutionary socialism, which contends that revolutionary upheaval is a necessary precondition for the structural changes necessary to transform a capitalist system to a qualitatively different socialist system. The urban reformist elites enthusiastically invoked reformative programmes, for example, regulating the disorder of urban space and “civilizing” people.

This article has focused primarily on the emergence of ‘OBIdient’ movement desperately seeking for change. The million dollars question is who is Peter Obi, aka ‘Okwute’ is PitObi a REVOLUTIONIST, a SOCIALIST or REFORMIST? I have been plundering on who exactly is Peter Obi, what character is he made of and his rabid dogs described as “Headless mobs” as for the OBIdients they are mostly angry disenchanted individuals and separatists agitators – very intolerant, violent and unreasonable crowd.

I am close to 50 pages into the 62 pages of Peter Obi’s manifesto and I dare say a lot of the things planned in there are only possible if the National Assembly (NASS) does not exist as a separate arm of government. This is aside from several repeated policies and some had been sponsored and even going through second reading in the National Assembly (NASS). Nothing speaks to that more than democracy is not about one-man show – this is the result you get when you have brainwashed the masses and normalised mediocrity. As a patriot, an avid reader, an author and a writer: I perfectly aligns with this school of thought with Prof Charles Chukwuma Soludo (CC) the current governor of Anambra.

From the foregoing, I am compelled to take side with Charles Chukwuma Soludo (CC), a Nigerian politician and economics professor who serves as the fifth democratic Governor of Anambra State. CC had profoundly posited in an article titled ‘History Beckons and I Will Not Be Silent (Part 1)’. “Let’s be clear: Peter Obi knows that he can’t and won’t win. He knows the game he is playing, and we know too; and he knows that we know,” “The game he is playing is the main reason he didn’t return to APGA. The brutal truth (and some will say, God forbid) is that there are two persons/parties seriously contesting for president: the rest is exciting drama!

In conclusion, permit my indulgence to use the style and voice of Ezenwo Nyesom Wike CON, a Nigerian politician and lawyer who is the sixth and current Governor of Rivers State. With special permission from His Excellency: “Because it’s fake. Ọ fake… Fake”- in Wike’s Voice. It is a paradox, how PitObi hoodwinked, cajoled, bamboozled and succeeded in making himself look like a SOCIALIST, REVOLUTIONIST or REFORMER.

Richard Odusanya
odusanyagold@gmail.com