I am getting close to speaking Chinese, Your Excellency. I have a strong feeling that you will understand me better when I go into full syncopation with Chinese orthography, articulating the quaint hieroglyphics of that mysterious language. Consider that my way of reminding you that you once called on the people of Bayelsa State to prepare to speak Chinese. It was a good thing, you said, to introduce that oriental language into the school curriculum so that our children can learn to speak Chinese from an early age, that they may become global citizens.
Permit me to bring to your notice that my children have already started eating rice and spaghetti with chopsticks rather than spoons and forks. They now watch the Chinese channel more than any other. They have found new heroes in modern Chinese films and videos. They are banking on your argument that, to speak Chinese, is to understand the mindset of the people of China, the new civilisation that is overtaking the world with its dazzling application of modern technology.
Every time I see a video about China, it strikes me as something out of this world. How can human beings build multiple layers of overhead bridges in the air, cars zapping in dizzying directions virtually among the clouds, and Yenagoa is still looking at one overhead bridge that is hardly in use because there are cracks in it? The Chinese have practically surmounted every obstacle in nature to make life easier for the citizenry. Nothing seems to be impossible with the Chinese. I bet there are no potholes to be seen along roads in China. The people just can’t stand the sight of potholes.
Check out the train system, Your Excellency. You stay in your house, and the train arrives at clock-work speed to pick you or drop you off, or else to drop off your kid from school while you wait for him in your seating room, pressing the buttons on your phone. Do you know that, in China, trains now run under water bodies, across extensive rivers, to dislodge their passengers on the other side of the shore, the way that giant whale swallowed Jonah and vomitted him on the shores of Nineveh? Talk about inventive engineering. And the rail grid is so tight that trains pass each other at split-minute intersections that simply take your breath away.
This is not fiction, Your Excellency. Check the internet. Zoom out to children in their classrooms. See what they learn from day to day. See what happens in their factories. Everything in China is about pressing a button or swiping a panel to get amazing results. The entire country has become overly sensitive to touch. You could tap a few buttons on your phone and next thing you know — bingo! — a cab is right there to pick you without a driver at the wheel. Tap another button and, behold, a drone descends from the sky to deliver your next meal the way a thoughtful crow fed Elijah in the wilderness.
Just take a look at how they produce their food, these Chinese people. See how wide their fields are, and how green the vales are, stretching out mile after mile into the horizon, more expansive than the imaginary rice fields of Peremabiri and Sampou can ever hope to be. Yet the tractors are there to mow down the grass, and harvest the crops with sickles and scythes that will confound the cave man of yore.
How did the Chinese get to be so bright and imaginative, Your Excellency? I guess something happened to their corporate mindset, to say nothing of their common heritage, when they closed their borders in times past. They resolved to have nothing to do with the rest of the world economy. They became independent onto themselves. They entered a season of incubation on a national scale, during which time they considered the true value of their assets and liabilities, and opted to make the best of everything.
They came to a new awakening about the infinite possibilities of the future. From the time they re-opened their borders till the present day, the world has continued to respond to everything from China with wonder and a resounding wow. Even Donald Trump felt threatened beyond his fears about covid nineteen, and could not stop blaming China for everything that was wrong with America.
I remember making that suggestion in the early days of Glory Land. I suggested that the our state government should close our state-wide borders, take inventory of our assets as a people, assess our manpower base, our productive potential, do away with everything extraneous, and show off our state as a model experiment in progress and development when we re-opened our borders to interact with the rest of Nigeria. It all sounds so utopian now, given the benefit of hindsight. Don’t blame me too much. I was thinking about China when I said that.
By the way, Your Excellency, thank you for the nice things you said about me at the service of songs in honour of retired Navy Captain Omoniyi Caleb Olubolade of blessed memory. I was not on the list of delegates from Bayelsa State to Lagos, but I have it on good authority that you commended me for having the presence of mind to write a book on Olubolade.
I very nearly held a grudge against my colleagues in the pen profession who did not think it necessary to report the fact that you actually began your exhortation with a reading from The First Captain of Creek Haven by Pope Pen. If not that I saw an exclusive clip of the occasion, I would have found it hard to believe. The fact that you read from your personal copy of my book was enough to give me a sense of accomplishment. I don’t mind clinking glasses to that cheerful news.
Lest I forget, Your Excellency, I have a word of advice to whisper to you. Do not leave the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). I am not one of your political appointees, so I can afford to tell you that. Do not depart from the party that brought you into office as the fifth son of Bayelsa State to be elected governor. I hope this advice is not coming too late. Let our state be the last bastion of the PDP in Nigeria.
Get me right. Do not succumb to the stampede. Stand your ground. Keep the faith. We don’t all have to join the bandwagon. I remember a few things you said in January, on the birthday of Sim Fubara, your colleague next door, about the longevity of the PDP. You had just emerged as Chairman of the South-South Governors’ Forum then.
You said some profound things about the abiding ideals of the party, and you immediately reminded me of the sheer fervour with which Diepreye Alamieyeseigha used to talk about the PDP in times past. In and out of office as governor, Alamieyeseigha was a fanatic of the party that led him, in the fulness of time, to wear his mantle as Governor-General of the Ijaw nation. He went so far as to say that PDP was an Ijaw party. That was excessive, yes, but do well to stay put.
Come to think of it, what did President Bola Tinubu say about the practice of democracy in his landmark speech of 12 June 2025? That was one heck of a speech, if you ask me, and I do mean to dissect it some more in the days to come. The President actually discouraged the idea of Nigeria evolving into a one-party state. I had to clap for him.
Just because your colleagues in Akwa Ibom and Delta States defected to the ruling party, gravitating to the pull of the centre, does not mean that you should follow suit. Be a man of steadfast principle, Your Excellency. Show yourself to be different from the pack.
Stand by the grain of your manifesto, and be proud to hold your umbrella over your head in the falling rain. If you will be the last PDP Governor in Bayelsa State, let it be proven at the next polls. You don’t have to be in a hurry to throw in the proverbial towel of submission in the open ring of politics, simply because your fellow Governors did so.
Let’s talk about something else, Your Excellency. I once had a son who waited alongside his father for that day when justice would be done, and compassion would compel you to release the portion of a hard-working labourer in the vineyard of Glory Land. My son would have been gloriously happy to know that justice prevailed at the Industrial Court, and that compassion would take a cue in the gracious heart of the Governor.
My son waited in vain. He waited for so long he could not wait any longer. He worried himself to a state of depression and died out of despair. He was 33 years old, my very first fruit. But he has younger brothers and sisters, thank God, who still share the same dream, the belief that one day the intolerable burden under which they groan will be lifted.
Holding chopsticks between their fingers, they live with the hope that one day Daddy will provide for them when his long-standing pay is released to him. I am still hopeful that you will be persuaded to foster this dream into reality in quick time. Consider the humble hopes of the children, Your Excellency. Do the needful. Obey the ruling of the court, and gain a big plus in the eyes of God. I don’t mind saying that in Chinese.
