By Ekanpou Enewaridideke
The time uncanny and the place mysterious Otuaro was recently caught dancing prolongedly for a woman. Some term the prolonged dance a skillfully choreographed ballet, tango and waltz of the end time when the tide still flows with vigour. For Otuaro to be caught dancing it naturally becomes a canal for the spontaneous flow and overflow of applause but dramatically turns a canal for the conveyance and flight of verbal contraband directed at him with deadly accuracy when the dancing is found to be at variance with reasons of governance, cultural obsession, cultural extravaganza, purposive theatricalization to purchase the mind for political reasons, religious devotion, occasional spiritual ecstasy precipitated by divine visitation, and filiation by marriage with the woman for whose valued entertainment the dance is choreographically staged.
In one memorable moment of story-telling sessions in my village always recalled and revisited nostalgically, Timiebi Maika philosophises that when a mind journeys successfully into progressive decomposition, it often hallucinates in ululations and monopolises the secular space backgrounded and supported by a derogatory language deployed in the description of an epic dance staged appreciatingly for a caring woman. For such a mind it is perpetually held captive and becomes the home of descriptive derogatory monsters. Could this be the parallel of the terrifyingly worrisome journey today? Or could this be insanity from an incurable neurotic literary mind for whom a journey of this kind becomes a potent medication for fitful relief or respite?
Otuaro is His Excellency Kingsley Burutu Otuaro, the deputy governor of Delta State, a revered Deacon in Christ Embassy, the passionate lover of any form of writings leavened or laced with marks of impersonality and deep thoughts at the point of production for consumption, particularly the genre Messrs Amafini Akemotubo and Custom Bulou intriguingly term poetry.
Pigeonholed over the years by keen observers as self-effacing, humble, loyal, meek, cultured, composed, resourceful, diligent, wordless in ideation and pragmatic in translation of ideas innovated, the world caught gastroenteritis and cold and felt nauseated, assaulted, stung and embarrassed by the discovery of how Otuaro was caught dancing for a woman – a man always distinguished by his thoughts of evangelism, ecumenism and prayerful orientations. Is Otuaro who is always viewed evangelically and ecumenically as a ruminant capable of this so-called prolonged dance with a woman not bonded to him by marriage? This Otuaro for whom many have volunteered political engineering, political cartography and political canalization without the luxury of formal invitation and professional engagement?
The magnetizing mystery about a deputy governor which produces pleasing vibratory aroma/aura and endears him to the people evanesces when he is caught dancing questionably for a woman without being aware he has been caught – particularly a beautiful woman different from his own dear wife who enjoys unquestionable proprietorship of a doctorate in Engineering.
To be caught dancing jubilantly for a woman, not backgrounded by thoughts of governance, evangelism and ecumenism, the ideals paraded by Otuaro over which people salivate to emulate now wear a disgusting sleeveless garment. This is a self-contradictory dance that beclouds and befogs the radiant dignity once radiated everywhere by Otuaro. Would Governor Okowa swallow these contradictory radiations from Otuaro at a time many have already pledged to work for him pro bono in political engineering and political canalization for the creation of a clear distance not endangered by the silence of a telescope? Is Okerenkoko aware of Otuaro’s dance for a woman at a questionable time and place?
Dancing could be the handmaiden of theatricalization because the life of a man begins with dance and ends with dance – as birth and death differently provoke dance seasonally at their different entry and terminal points. A mother perpetually builds into the child rhythms of dance during occasional lullabied sessions right from birth. Was it this congenital exposure Otuaro was trying to theatricalise as a deputy governor when he was unfortunately caught dancing for a woman? Is Christ Embassy aware of this aberrational dance, the likelihood of which is that of a journey into debauchery insulated from prying eyes?
Could have Otuaro, a consummate connoisseur of literary wine, a great footballer whose soccer genius is still being told nostalgically in Okerenkoko town, ventured into a questionable dance for a woman at a time his blazing evangelical and ecumenical thoughts, activism and advocacy for peace in the Niger Delta have assumed brobdingnagian proportions no Lilliputian can ignore, even in pretended claims of non-knowledge of? Who on earth will forgive this epic fall of a deputy governor gripped inescapably by an overdose of matriarchal drugs administered in wrong routes when they should have taken intravenous routes unseen by wild storytellers and chronic gossips?
When a man errs, the next turn one intuitively turns to is that of apologetic labour for forgiveness but for a man who is meek, honest, loyal, focused, visionary, clear-headed, human, philanthropic and pragmatic, weaned quite early on the diet of Religious Discourse, Educational Discourse, Morality Discourse, Emancipation Discourse, Cultural Discourse, Development Discourse, Tourism Discourse and Peaceful Co-Existence Discourse, there is no justification whatsoever for Otuaro to careen or slide into a questionable dance for a woman and have his passport or identity card of prevarication stamped because he is very much at home with the implications of his action. Only the ignorant merits pardon, rehabilitation and reintegration into society, not Otuaro whose action signals deliberate inversion, prevarication and murder of valued ideals hitherto held with an air of sanctity. It is a case of murder, not a case of manslaughter.
It was just yesterday I was told a great story while I was on my way to Akparemogbene to see my septuagenarian mother who is already on the voyage to the club of octogenarians. This story strikes me as a very important one because its moral pronounces Otuaro guilty on the one-count charge of being caught dancing for a woman.
