By his defection from the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, former Minister of Aviation, Mr. Femi Fani-Kayode, has unpleasantly swallowed his vomit.
This is the declaration of the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina.
In his weekly column, From The Inside …Friday with Femi Adesina, the president’s spokesman said the experience of Fani-Kayode swallowing his vomit was not a pleasant one and not many would indulge in it.
His words: “And come to think of it. Is it pleasant to swallow one’s vomit? Nah. But that was what FFK did. All those foul words against the President, the APC, the government, many people in government. He has swallowed them. Delicious? By no means. Pueh! You would feel like retching. So, let’s salute the courage of his conviction. It is rare, and not many people would do it.”
It would be recalled that Femi-Fani Kayode, an unsparing critic of President Muhammadu Buhari and APC, defected to the ruling party to the surprise of many.
Given his criticism of Buhari and the APC, it has been considered unimaginable that FFK could return to the ruling party.
Adesina also spoke about why Buhari decided to welcome Fani-Kayode who had hauled abuses at him on different occasions before his defection.
According to Adesina, Buhari decided to welcome the “prodigal son” out of sheer display of mercy.
Said he: “By agreeing to the readmission of FFK to APC as the leader of the party, and hosting him at the Villa, President Buhari displayed amazing capacity to forgive, to show mercy, and let bygones be bygones. How many of us can do that? Not many…
“That was what Buhari did to FFK. He showed him mercy, dropping like gentle rain from heaven, when he could have otherwise spat into the sky, collecting the spittle with his own face. Was that not what me and you would have done? Confess. We would have told FFK to go to hell, and stay there. But Buhari didn’t. He displayed an attribute of God: forgiveness.”
The media aide said Buhari’s decision to welcome Fani-Kayode back had also proved wrong those who had the belief that the president did not have a forgiving spirit.
“One of the lies that had been serially told against the President was his alleged unforgiving spirit, a falsehood sold to Nigerians by anti-Buhari forces since the days of military rule. The lie traveled for so long, till it was eventually overtaken by the truth in one day. Nigerians saw through the facade, and elected Buhari as President in 2015. Re-elected him with wider margin in 2019.
“I have worked with the President for over six years. And I have seen amazing things in terms of accommodation and capacity to forgive. I have visited him at home many times in the evenings, only to find at dinner table with him people who had been abusing his forefathers on television earlier in the day. This President has a capacity to forgive, and forget. And make peace. That was what he displayed in the case of FFK. Nothing short of divine attribute, which me and you should covet and seek to approximate,” Adesina writes.
