I once read about a story that talked about freedom. Once upon a time, some circus workers captured a baby elephant from its family in the amazon jungle of South America. This elephant was very aggressive and violent towards its captors. It resented deeply its forced seperation from its mother and the rest of its family. It fought its captors bravely but unsuccessfully and they were able to subdue it a little, bind its legs and carry it on a horse drawn cart to the circus camp.

On getting to the circus camp, they tied up the elephant to an iron stake in driven deep into the ground. The elephant tried time after time to get away from his captors but each time he tried, when he had stretched the chain fully, he got stopped by the chain and had to return back to the stake. He kept on doing this for days and after a while resigned to fate that he could never be free from bondage.

One day after many months, one of his captors came and removed the chain from his ankle and literally set him free. The elephant simply walked to the same point at which the chain gets fully stretched and stopped. After a while, he returned to sit by the stake. Day after day, the elephant performed the same ritual, never stepping beyond the point he had been unable to cross when he was bound.

The elephant though hav’n been set free in reality was still bound in his mind and as a result could not live in the reality of his freedom.
The state of the elephant is one I like to define as being delivered but not being free.

Many people are like the elephant in this story. They have shut down their minds to freedom so much that in the moment of their deliverance, they are not aware of the consequent freedom that attends it. Deliverance is many times an external activity but freedom must be internal.
People’s minds are bound to the prevailing circumstances in the environment. I just got into Ado-Ekiti, the capital of Ekiti state with a great opportunity. I really expected to be greeted with enthusiasm and drive, rather I was met with skepticism and excuses. I almost got discouraged but quickly recognised the fact the deliverance vs. freedom issue springing to the fore.

People don’t want to fail forward. They don’t want to try something that looks like something they have failed at before. It is no wonder that Nigerians support one club in England this season and another in Spain next season and another in England next season and so on….People are so used to rushing after the winning team. They don’t understand the importance of building a winning team.

I couldn’t help but wonder, “what will it take me to drive the elephant beyond the boundary of his bondage in his mind?”. “what do I need to do to open the eyes of his mind?”

People have one negative thing or the other to say about network marketing and I ask myself.

“would people rather stay on a job, work their lives out, hate their bosses and their organisations, earn less than they desire, deprive their family of necessarily time  and still get stuck int he rat race simply because they are unwilling to bolster up courage and write their own stories?”

“If network marketing especially those with models by which you can earn passive income for the rest of your life  isn’t the fairest type of marketing inthe world, then tell me is it conventional marketing that only rewards the direct salesman and not the chain of advertisers, referrers or indirect marketers?”

“Why are people hypocritically behaving as if there’s one particular thing they are passionate about, the absence of which they’d rather die when it’s obvious that all they truly wish for is freedom (financial and otherwise)?”.

“If only wishes were horses, even beggars will ride”.

“The proof of desire is pursuit”.

Apparently, loads of people around here are not desirous of freedom, they only wish it, otherwise, they’ll pursue it with all they’ve got.
Deliverance is not equivalent to freedom until one gets involved in making it so.

Deliverance is to wishing what desire and pursuit are to freedom.
You may have been delivered, but are you free?

Person 1

Person 2: gd

Person 1: na wa o

Person 1: you no see wetin dey happen for ekiti?

Person 2: nna ur pple be as they get o!

Person 2: though i had a feeling it was gonna happen

Person 1: no be dem o

Person 1: na the party dey set them up

Person 2: as the PDP can not afford for pride to allow them lose ekiti

Person 1: exactly

Person 1: you get the picture totally

Person 2: it would show that they had lost their foothold in the west

Person 1: you r too much

Person 1: you r saying the same thing i told people yday

sola adepoju: lagos gone, ondo gone, ogun going, and now ekiti?

Person 1: and they wont succeed

Person 1: edo gone as well

Person 2: i wont be surprisd if when they declare ido-osi, they declare like all the registered voters voted for pdp

Person 1: oh! they’ve declared it earlier

Person 2: its jst crazy and the antics of our distinguished and very honourable senators ao arise and femi kila

Person 1: 15,000 votes to pdp

Person 1: and 3,000 to ac

Person 2: they declared like 15k for pdp and 3k for ac

Person 1: and there are not up to 10,000 registered voters in ido osi

Person 2: do they think we are idiots?

Person 1: they are silly guys

Person 2: i think i am a prophet

Person 2: the same thing wld happen in oye 1 n 2

Person 1: you r my brother

Person 1: yes o

Person 2: still there?

Person 1: but God no go gree them

Person 1: i’m really sa

Person 1: d

Person 2: who r the pple in d streets supporting?

Person 1: this is the same PDP who kept saying AC was importing thugs through fayose and fayemi’s fathers’ burials

Person 1: fayemi is the popular candidate

Person 1: with the grassroots

Person 2: who have the power to import more thugs, or thugs in police uniform, fake soldiers and all

Person 1: very dirty of the PDP

Person 2: all in all, i think we are approaching our rebranding the wrong way

Person 1: i didn’t want to be partisan before but now i can see that staying on the fence is tantamount to supporting evil

Person 2: lets start first with the pdp, or change the pay-off to “Nigeria, good pple, bad leaders”

Person 2: LOL

Person 1: PDP stalwarts are dealing with journalists as if they were the opposition

Person 1: lol

Person 1: not bad at all

Person 1: i’ll write a post today with that topic

Person 2: Edmund burke once said “the only thing needed for evil to succedd is for men of goodwill, to be unconcerned. or something like that

Person 1: yeah….the only permission darkness needs to prevaill is for light to refuse to shine…..my paraphrase

Person 2: i am really pissed with the situation

Person 1: not as much as me man

Person 1: i’m repulsed

Person 1: but i’m sure that the will of the people will prevail

Person 2: but the more important thing for me is that good governance should be entrenched.

Person 2: as the onus is for the opposition to show that they are up to the task.

Person 2: the onus is for oshiomole, mimiko and fayemi, if and when he is eventually allowed to be governor to show that they are a credible alternative to the PDP.

Person 2: Fashola is already laying a good foundation in Lagos

Person 2: i was in ogun last weekend and someone jokinly said that come 2011, they wld kidnap fashola and keep him in hiding for four yrs so that he can be telling whoeva becomes their governor how to make impact in the lives of pple.

Person 2: his only remedy wld be if he agrees to govern both states together.

Person 2: pple are now appreciating good things.

Person 2: at least pple are voluntarily paying taxes now seeing that government is having direct impact on their lives.

BUZZ!!!

Person 1: sorry man

Person 2: ore u still there?

Person 2: got to go work beckons.

Person 2: catch u some other time!

Person 1: yeah

Person 1: i feel you

Person 1: the opposition must rise to the task ahead

Person 2: k

Person 1: for me, i didn’t feel segun oni was a bad governor at all

Person 1: his only problem was that he had a disconnect with the grass roots

Person 2: that is the only way, if not they would just be part of the problem

Person 1: i believe both candidates are good 

Person 2: fayose was not also a bad governor but he had a lot of excesses.

Person 1: i agree

Person 1: fayose touched the grassroots but failed to discipline himself

Person 2: and the excesses eventually did not allow for much progress in the state.

Person 1: the people still feel that he was the best governor ekiti ever had till date

Person 1: not at all

Person 1: u served there abi?

Person 2: lets hope and pray and act so that the opposition can show that there is a beta way.

Person 1: you must have seen that the basic benefits of democracy is lacking in about 80

Person 1: percent of the state

Person 1: abi o

Person 2: fayose really had a way of connecting with the masses though it was all PR gimmicks. 

Person 2: i was there

Person 2: really got to go now.

Person 2: i’ll keep this conversation and like use it when i eventually write an article on ekiti state.

Person 2: be good ore mi busy

Person 2: bye

Person 1: no wahala

Person 1: thanks for yarning

Person 1: i’ll drop in to see you soon

Person 1: cheers man

Person 2: k

Person 2: looking 4ward to it

A while ago, I was given an assignment by The Future movement to go and deliver the future in Ekiti state. Funny, isn’t it? Now, my state of origin is Ekiti state. I hail from Ijero town in Ijero-Ekiti Local Government. My grandfather has a house in Ekiti State and though he lived majorly in Lagos and got a chieftaincy title in Mushin, he was taken to Ekiti when he died and buried in Ijero.

I gave you that info to let you know that the probable reason for sending me to Ekiti state may have been because of my affiliation to the state. Also, it may just have been coincidental as Ekiti state was due to hold re-run elections and it was timely that the future had a voice in ensuring that peace and equity reigned supreme in the Land. The major contestants in the election re-run are Dr Kayode Fayemi of Action Congress Party and Engr. Segun Oni of the People’s Democratic Party.

So, here was I being told to return to my place of origin to impact them positively. What was my assignment? My assignment was to get illustrious and notable sons and daughters of Ekiti state to grant a 30-sec recording where they highlighted the following:

            i. Your vote is your voice

            ii. Say “No” to violence

            iii. We are all one Ekiti family

            iv. We must deliver the future

As my worthy companion and partner on the trip I had Christian Love, a foremost change agent with respect to the emergence of a New Nigeria. Of course, I also had the blessings of Fela Durotoye, Deoluakinyemi, Femi Onagoruwa, SEGA (Segun Awosanya), Yinka Banjo, Akuns and Deola Kayode among others.  

Fela got in touch with Mr Dare Babarinsa who is from Ekiti and spoke to him about our project. He agreed to lend his voice and face to our recording and promised to link us up with some of our prospects. We had a camcorder recording of his message at his office about 1 week ago and he did link us up with a good number of prospects. We sent text messages to them and proceeded to Ekiti to make the historic recordings.

The first person who responded to our gesture was the former governor of Ekiti state – Ayo Fayose. I was shocked at his warmness and frankness. I half expected something else, but was pleasantly surprised to find that he was a humble man. He asked to meet us up where we were and truly came to meet us there. We were on the way to Ado Ekiti and had just gotten to Iyin Ekiti.

He found out where we were in Iyin and drove down to meet us there. He didn’t have elaborate security either. Just a couple of armed mobile policemen. I requested after greeting him that we go somewhere comfortable for him and he wished it away saying where we were was comfortable enough for him even though we were on the highway with bushes all around us.

He led us straight through a path in the bush and he told us he was ready. Our crew was almost disorientated but we put ourselves together and he gave us a spirited message of non-violence and peace. We exchanged pleasantries and he expressed his hope at meeting us again soon. He then appealed to us to ensure we involved the grassroots in our recording. He advised us to speak with market women and okada riders and not only known and respected personalities in the state.

So started my sojourn in Ekiti state on a mission for the future and immediately the team’s morale was boosted. We were certain that we’ll succeed on this quest. A few minutes later, a phone call came in from Senator Ayo Arise…

      ”Hello Sir, my name  is Busayo Akanro and I’m from the future.”

catch the rest later.

I had been given a mandate by the future movement to go and set the ball rolling with respect to organising a political debate between the political aspirants of the annulled April 18, 2007 elections. Elections had been annulled in 10 out of 16 local government council areas by an Appeal court and a re-run had been ordered. The election rerun in the state is billed to take place on the 25th April, 2009.

As a result, the whole of the nation has it’s eyes fixed on Ekiti and the re-run elections. What will be the outcome? Will the sacked governor return or will a new governor be sworn in? The question on everyone’s lips “Oni or Fayemi, who will it be?” Well, back to the purpose of my trip. I was sent to a particular Pastor who had a passion for seeing a new Nigeria emerge and another interesting young man who lived for the ideals of a new Nigeria.

I set out with so much unknown yet so much anticipation. I had prayed and was sure that God will direct my steps and put a smile on my face when I returned to give the report to the uture movement. I arrived Ekiti about 2pm yesterday afternoon, after a four and a half hour journey and after waiting for two hours at the bus park. I met with my young friend after a couple of phone calls and we both went to meet with the Pastor at his church’s new building site.

About a dozen people were engaged in one activity or the order, dirtied from sand, mud and dust, they were either pushing wheelbarrows laden with construction materials or mixing with spades or carrying head pans “pon-pon” filled with mixed concrete to pour in the mould that was made for the foundation of the building. The Pastor himself was dressed in very old clothes I discovered as he approached to welcome me and his hands very dirty with mud. He smiled as he welcomed me warmly and hesitated at my stretched out hand, showing me his mud covered ones and asking if I didn’t mind. I said I didn’t and locked his right hand in a very strong handshake despite the the dried dirt on it. Afterall, I was at home and was meeting with my own kin.

Immediately, I launched into the agenda of my visit and he came up to speed quite quickly with it. Anyway, according to him, it had been a burning desire on his heart so it seemed to be happening at the right time. We discussed together the factors we needed to take up immediately with regards to the seminar/debate. In a few mins, we had set out deliverables and he had assured me that if I was going to wait till the next morning, he’d give me an update on the reaction and decision of other key stakeholders he would be speaking with yesterday evening. I instantly assured him that I’ll be waiting till the next morning ofcourse. I had vowed to take responsibility for the political state in Ekiti and needed to begin to relate even more closely with its people as well as stay in the state a little more than before.

I left his place after we spent several minutes discussing the polity of Ekiti state and was picked up by my Auntie who serves as the chairman of the National Association of Nurses and Midwives-Ekiti Branch and we drove to her house where I spent the night. I was treated to a very large and delectable meal of pounded yam and efo riro soup with eja kika and beef.

Shortly after I loaded up with the food, my friend Kunle Alashi came calling and we had a good discussion on many aspects of life. I spent some time feeling the vibes of politics in the state while discussing my mission to my Auntie. She gave me some insight into why she preferred “the devil we know to an angel we don’t know”. Those were her exact words in referring to the two major gubernatioral aspirants.

I slept soundly feeling very strongly the fresh and very cool breeze of the country. I almost didn’t get out of bed excepting the fact that I had an appointment by 7am. I met our Pastor friend again and he gave me updates on the situation. Needless to say that he gave some very encouraging news and promised to tie up the loose ends by the end of the week. He set up a small committee to work with me on the project and I the feeling of excitement at the success of this project was thick in the air as I discussed it with them.

I was told that I had to make another trip to Ekiti by next week to tie up the loose ends and that what was most important now was getting the consent of the aspirants to appear for the debate. By and large, I left Ekiti this morning in high spirits dreaming about the program and its resultant success and ofcourse the effect of that success on the people of Ekiti state.

Enlightened followership would have been created and the middle class who usually don’t take  responsibility by voting will have been encouraged to vote. The title of the seminar/debate is “Your vote,your voice” and the name of this gracious Pastor friend is Tunde Afe of the House of Faith Church, Ado Ekiti. I’ll write about updates of this meeting as they happen and I believe another Barack Obama scenario is in the making. Ekiti state will be the pilot and the rest of Nigeria will surely follow. God bless Nigeria. God bless Ekiti State.