One has always been in support of Adams Oshiomhole for better and for worse… and for several reasons. Not least because he bears the name of the first man, Adam, but also because I came across a poem by Hilaire Belloc titled “The Frog” in secondary school, and this changed my perspective of handsome men like Adams. It was a simple poem which I readily committed to memory. It says:
Be kind and tender to the Frog,
And do not call him names,
As ‘Slimy skin,’ or ‘Polly-wog,’
Or likewise ‘Ugly James,’
Or ‘Gape-a-grin,’ or ‘Toad-gone-wrong,’
Or ‘Billy Bandy-knees’:
The Frog is justly sensitive
To epithets like these.
No animal will more repay
A treatment kind and fair;
At least so lonely people say
Who keep a frog (and, by the way,
They are extremely rare).
That is exactly the point; you should not call the frog, “Ugly James” or “Ugly Adams” because that would be an ugly thing to say to such a good looking animal. Neither should you say ugly things about Adams at all. No politician would more repay a treatment kind and fair than Adams. When the good people of Edo State were kind and tender to him and elected him the governor of the state he repaid them with the most visible foreign investment the state had ever known – a model of a wife so pretty you would think ice would not melt in her mouth. While his contemporaries like Akpabio and Amaechi were building infrastructures and roads, Adams knew (like the Adam of the Bible) that the most important thing in every garden was not a bridge or school or hospital, but an “Eve.” While his contemporaries could not assess their achievements anymore today, Adams still goes around with his beautiful and prized possession and she shares his bed.
Adams also built for himself on Edo soil a palatial building. Not exactly because he wanted where to run to if he were to hear the sound of the Department of State Security or Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, walking in the garden of Edo State. Not because he needed where to hide himself, and stop DSS from discovering his nakedness. Of course, he never thought that a day would come that the serpent would come with temptation.
The first serpent tempted the first mother and Adams thought this might repeat itself and kept his “investment” away from the serpents of politics. Wrong! The serpent tempted him directly, and whether he fell for it or not no one can yet tell. Because the operatives of the DSS never went to good schools, they never came across poems like “The Frog.” They, therefore, have no respect for Adams and his good looks.
Adams leapt around the country like a frog and splashed water on all and sundry. No national conversation ever ended without Adams having his say. He even threatened to sack ministers who trifled with him and his office as the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress.
Ministers who failed to report progress, if you know what we mean, could come under his axe. He was a demi-god of sorts and a capo di tutti capi (boss of all bosses) who carried a big stick and spoke a bombastic language. But those he “splashed water” on were stalking him and waiting for the opportunity to strike.
When the spymaster Lawal Daura, former director general of the DSS fell, Daura laid the blame on Adams. This Adams was the talking point – just like the Adams in the bible who dominated the first three chapters of the Bible.
Daura claimed that he acted on Adams orders. Adams rushed to his defense but Daura had crossed the red light by locking out members of the National Assembly and making ridicule of the Nigerian National Assembly in the comity of nations. The presidency stuck to their guns and Daura took a walk. But Adams continued unperturbed. To him this was merely like the first Adam losing Abel to Cain.
But you see Adams did not know about the story of the frog that Pa Jumbo tells to his particular friends. By particular friends we mean those who he does not like.
The story goes that there was a frog which used to terrorise Jumbo’s grandmother when Jumbo was a boy. All efforts to kill the frog were abortive as the frog was always a step ahead.
The frog would even jump into the old woman’s bath water and jump out at her approach. When harmattan came the old woman boiled water to use and increase the temperature of her cold bath water.
Then she dashed into the room to get her soap. On coming back the frog had jumped into the hot water and died. She pulled out the frog and said to its carcass, “Frog didn’t someone tell you that there are two kinds of water? I guess now you know. Next time watch out for the fumes.”
It does appear that no one told the handsome gentleman Adams that there were, like water, two kinds of politicians. Those who blow hot air and those who blow cold. You are likely to suffer if you mess with those who blow hot air. These “frog killers” have tended not to be kind and tender to my man Adams. Before you could say “Frog” the DSS had invited Adams for questioning. I mean a whole Adams Oshiomhole the great. Am sad!
But different people, different strokes. For daring to interrogate Adams, Jumbo, war veteran and pal, says had forgiven the DSS one third of all their sins.
He claims on good authority and is willing to back it up with an affidavit, that he would forgive them another third of all their sins if they also question one Olusegun Obasanjo. To forgive them the final third, Jumbo would want Obasanjo returned to where he came from – prison – or have someone lock his mouth with padlock and only open it for him to eat.
Pardon Jumbo he always expands the discussion and take it out of defined lines. Meanwhile Adams left the country after his grilling by the DSS and is expected back soon.
The DSS wants to continue the grilling from where they stopped when he returns. You may wish to refer the DSS to this poem and urge them to be kind and tender….
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