Maroof Asudemade

There is an old African saying that whoever throws a stone at a palm tree should pray that the stone does not rebound with greater force. Politics, like life, has an uncanny way of returning every boast to its owner.

During a now-viral interview, the governorship candidate of the Allied People’s Movement (APM), Bimbo Adekanmbi, jokingly claimed that he had instructed his spellcaster to throw stones of division into the Oyo State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC). According to him, the disagreements within the party following its governorship primary were evidence that the mystical assignment had been successfully executed.

Whether Nigerians treated the statement as comedy, sarcasm or political theatre, one thing is becoming difficult to ignore: if there is any house currently shaking under the weight of internal disagreement, it is no longer Oyo APC but the APM itself.

Reports of an open confrontation between Governor Seyi Makinde and one of his principal political allies, Alhaji AbdulRasheed Adebisi Olopoeyan, over the alleged imposition of chairmanship and councillorship candidates have thrown the party into avoidable turmoil. The irony is almost poetic. The same political family that celebrated itself as a refuge from crisis is now grappling with allegations of parallel candidate lists and deep internal mistrust.

It is tempting to ask whether Adekanmbi’s spellcaster misunderstood the address. Perhaps the mystical stone, instead of landing in the compound of Oyo APC, made a U-turn and crashed through the roof of APM. Instead of dividing the opposition, it now appears to have unsettled the very platform on whose behalf the boast was made. The imagery is impossible to ignore. A man throws a stone towards his neighbour’s house only to hear the loudest sound from his own rooftop.

Political arrogance has always been dangerous because it assumes that today’s advantage is permanent. Those who celebrate the troubles of others often forget that politics is governed more by irony than certainty. Alliances shift. Friends become rivals. Parties that laugh today may cry tomorrow.

If the reports of parallel candidates across all 33 local government areas and 352 councillorship positions are anything to go by, the APM has a more urgent assignment than searching for mystical victories over its opponents. It must first resolve the conflict within its own walls.

The episode also offers a lesson beyond Oyo politics. Democracies are not strengthened by superstition or by triumphal declarations that unseen forces are responsible for the fortunes of political parties. Elections are won through organisation, persuasion, credible leadership and public confidence, not through spellcasters, talismans or imaginary stones.

The real danger of such rhetoric is that it trivialises the hard work required to build a political party while encouraging supporters to attribute ordinary political disagreements to supernatural manipulation.

As the saying goes, when a man digs a pit for another, he should first measure its depth. When he throws a stone at a palm tree, he should also be prepared for the possibility that gravity may have the final laugh.

If recent developments are any indication, Bimbo Adekanmbi’s legendary spellcaster may indeed deserve recognition, not for dividing Oyo APC, but for accidentally demonstrating that the first casualty of political boasting is often the boaster’s own house.