Tinubu, Sanwo-El and the god of fish, by Festus AdeDayo

(Published by The Sunday Tribune, 8 June 2025)

As Ngugi Wa Thiong’o says in his wizard of the Corvo, (2007) the anger is more corrosive than fire. Don’t make mistakes: President Bola Tinubu is angry. When Tinubu was the same angry way, I wrote a piece entitled Tinubu the ap’ejalodo and his strange friend of fish (18 September 2018). That fairy tale was one of the stories that contributed to tame the greed of the pre and post-colonial society Yoruba, as well as any tendency to interpret God.

At that 2018, Tinubu had decided to replace Akinwunmi both as governor of the state of Lagos. The piece, using that anecdote, was to warn him not to take the place of God. Similar stories contributed to modeling the moral man in Africa. His cosmology was governed by anecdotes, traditions and customs that prescribed moral codes. For centuries, these have supported the Forte of Africa association and morality. The anecdotes that sketched a potential emperor of traveling the path of ruin were told to children, even in their infanances; The same about small thieves who came to horrible ends. For example, the destructive end of the greed has been foreseen in the pre-colonial society Yoruba in the emblematic history of the turtle and the hot porridge burning on the fire that stole and put at the head of his head. He burned the scalp. Allow me to tell the anecdote.

Set in an African village, the story is that of a miserable young fisherman (ap’ejalodo) who was devastated by bankruptcy. He has not been able to capture enough fish over the years to save him from the dense lack of lack. One day, however, while pushing the fishing hook into the river, he captured one of the biggest fish he had ever seen. Excited, Ap’ejalodo pulled his fantastic recovery on the river bank and proceeded to tear it.

As he tried to bring him to the basket, however, the fish began to speak like a human being. Ap’ejalodo was initially afraid, but in the end he stopped and listened to the strange fish sermon. Singing, ap’ejalodo, mo de, ja ju lo lo lo lo … (fisherman, here I come …) the fish asked to be saved by the fisherman.

He promised that if the fisherman spared his life, instead of this rescue, he should have asked for what he wanted in life. Excited, ap’ejalodo left him out of the hook and asked for wealth. Really, when he returned home, the clothes frayed on him and his wife had become great Damask Agbada and Aran respectively, with their miserable hut transformed into a great home. Both now began to live the life of unimaginable splendor.

After a few years, the couple was however sterile and his wife begged ap’ejalodo to go fishing again and ask his fish friend to save them from social shame. As he pushed the hook back into the river, he captured the strange fish and the previous process was repeated. This time, he asked a child and the strange fish granted him, giving him children. Over the years, the fisherman has masterfully evoked fish through the same process and the fish saved the couple.

Then one day, ap’ejalodo and wife were only waking up from their magnificent bed when an blinding and introing radius of the sun winded into their bedroom. Infuriated, Mrs. Ap’ejalodo could not understand the audacity that the sun had to intrude on their sacristy. Couldn’t it respect the privacy and majesty of the richest couple on Earth? Then he was angrily commanded Ap’ejalodo to meet his fish friend and asked that they were given the power to control the daredevil of the sun and other impertinent celestial forces.

Outside of Ap’ejalodo he went to the river bank, he pushed his fishing hook into the river and invoked the strange fish again. And Ap’ejalodo made his appeal. The fish was peeed by the avidity and audacity of the fisherman. “You were nobody; I made you someone and now you have everything to your beck and call. Yet, you want to compete with God in Majesty and you will not even allow a common sun to shine and perform the illuminating assignment that God has brought him to perform on earth!”

The fish rushed angrily into the river and while Ap’ejalodo, shot down, returned home, his old dress torn and suddenly returned to him, his home turned into the hut of the past and the last miserable of the couple was more surprising than that of the past.

After writing that piece in 2018, as fate would have done, I was wrong and Tinubu was right. Despite the different plea for him, Ap’ejalodo had his way and both became history. Today, Ap’ejalodo has in contact with all his candidates governor since 2007. He tried to remove them all but he only succeeded with both. On every occasion, he made himself the victim of his disagreements with his students, responding to that declaration of Oscar Wilde according to which you cannot be too careful in the choice of your enemies. Babajide Sanwo-Oell joined the notorious train of the victims of the ferocious anger of Tinubu.

Already in January of this year, Bees of Power’s Tovali’s Tovali’s Tovali in Alausa and Aso Rock hinted that Ap’ejalodo was angry. While Ambode’s error was unable to download funds, Sanwo-Ever was his indiscretion and recklessness. It was said that an alleged friend of the governor had helped him to Corriere Lagos funds in Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi to allow him to win the Governorate of 2023 While he won his Lagos elections, Ap’ejalodo lost. Ap’ejalodo actually did not worry that he lost the elections, with the aim of cutting the wings, but resuming his superordination of Lagos in a subsequent estimated victory in court. During a meeting of the two, while the Governor swore his innocence, it was said that Ap’ejalodo had derived him mocked him, claiming that he had safety relationships that affirmed the transaction. The stroke that broke the back of the camel was the Governor’s Effrontery in removing the speaker Mudashiru Obasa, the protect of Ap’ejalodo who had been openly rude to the governor.

Twice in a week, Ap’ejalodo has ridiculed Sanwo-Oell, both in the commissioning of Lagos-Calabar Highway and in Lekki Free Port Road. He jumped by shaking his hands in one and ensured his absence in the other. You could hear the droves of vultures waiting to feed the governor’s meat. In the commissioning of Port Road, Ap’ejalodo was smoking by all cylinders: “I am happy that the deputy governor of Lagos is here. Take that we will remove all the approvals provided on the setbacks already provided. No more planning approvals for those unwanted islands created illegally created,” he said. Ngugi Wa Thiong’o was really right. The anger is corrosive.

Ap’ejalodo, having been raised by his fish God friend to have a firmly rested elephant on his head, still wants to know what small crickets are doing in their small holes. It is infuriated by the Audacity of the Sanwo-Oell Sun to intrude on its sacristy. The coach employee could not respect the majesty of n. 1 citizen of Nigeria, his richest and most powerful man on earth?

Once again, I am sure that we are about to attend the deeroument of this macabre drama of Ap’ejalodo who tries to appropriate and approximate the power of God. Perhaps, the young man who has stoned the Iroko tree a few years ago is mature for the punishment of the celestial forces to his attempt to wear the same trousers with God?

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