By Ori Martins
The iconic Prof Chinua Achebe had a celebrated knack for creating weird tragic heroes. Virtually all his protagonists were established and crowned tragic heroes.
Okonkwo of Things Fall Apart, Ezeulu in Arrow of God and No Longer at Ease’s Obi Okonkwo were all tragic heroes of various magnitudes and multiple dimensions.
All tragic heroes have some traits and characteristics in common – they usually descend from the exalted position and commanding Olympic height of glory to the despicable gutter of inanity.
The present democratic adumbration has magnificently thrown up some regrettable tragic characters who deserve pity in its most practicable piety. One of such personalities is Hon Bede Eke, member representing Aboh Mbaise, Ngor Okpala Federal Constituency in the Federal House of Representatives.
Eke, from Ngor Okpala bend of the federal constituency, dreamed returning to the national assembly for a third term. The PDP delegates who had solidly stood by him in the last eight years, fully convinced that their national lawmaker had substantially retrogressed and nosedived in capacity, performance as well as delivery, decided to vote him out during the last PDP primary elections.
For that, Eke had been fretting and prancing about. He is understandably sullen and subdued.
Not only that, the once sociable, delectable and humane Eke has suddenly become an area scatter and a trouble maker of some sorts. He is no longer the vibrant Gospel crusader, an evangelist who went about preaching peace, tolerance and forgiveness.
Eke, in the present circumstances, is an agent of tit – for – tat, an eye for an eye (even when nobody in actual fact hurt had hurt or scratched him) and his messages and actions are now woven in retaliation and decisive coins.
Ever since Eke lost the PDP third term return ticket, he has working relentlessly for the collapse of Imo State chapter of the PDP. To realize this satanic ambition, Eke ran to the national secretary of PDP, Senator Samuel Anyanwu otherwise known as Samdaddy.
Samdaddy, by his actions and inactions, works for Governor Hope Uzodimma and the APC. Knowing he cannot have his vaulting ambition realized in the 2023 governorship election in Imo State, Samddady has reached an agreement with Uzodimma.
The agreement is for Samddady to work for Uzodimma by causing confusion in PDP in order to stop former governor, Rt Hon Emeka Ihedioha for the unlikely re – election of Uzodimma’s second tenure. When this happens as they aimlessly reckon, Ihedioha would have been out of the calculus thereby making way for Samddady in 2027.
The above is the infantile and destructive project which Eke has immorally been recruited into and he is now one of the pilot executioners. It is from this undignified standpoint that Eke, according to verifiable sources, has approached the supreme court of Nigeria, praying that the apex judicial institution to administer to the Aboh Mbaise, Ngor Okpala Federal Constituency’s PDP primary election, the same hammer it applied on the Imo West (Orlu Zone) PDP senatorial candidate. Can you beat that?
Is there any other justification or proof that Eke is an agent, working in collaboration with Samdaddy on how to destroy Imo PDP for Uzodimma’s APC to return to power?
If Eke is a faithful and sincere party man, since the court of appeal had ordered for fresh primary election, according to the prayers the appellant, he ought to have either got poised for a re – contest or watch proceedings from the sidelines. But he chose the path of infamy – to destroy Imo PDP!
Every of Eke’s move since he lost the PDP primary election has been orchestrated and backed by the enemies of the party, including Imo APC leaders and thier PDP moles led by the national secretary.
Achebe’s most famous and talked about tragic hero is Okonkwo of Things Fall Apart. After his gradual but eventual even painful, pathetic end, Okonkwo’s confidant, Obierika, apparently with misty eyes, emotion laden voice and physically terrified, payed a most rewarding and corresponding tribute delivered in an elegy.
“That man was one of the greatest men in Umuofia. You drove him to kill himself., and now he will be buried like a dog”.
Of course, there is nothing great about Eke, for now. Rather, he has been a great beneficiary of PDP as he was a two time Imo State House of Assembly member ( though not consecutively) and he has been a national lawmaker since 2015. And before that, a federal agency board chairman.
With his present political mannerism, let not Bede Eke be “buried” like a “political dog” as it has been the lot of all traitors, saboteurs and backbiters. It is not too late for him to turn a new leaf.
