Men are in sizes and life is in stages. Asue Ighodalo and Monday Okpebholo nor mate
Rev Olu Martins
Years ago my father was privileged to join the league of those who purchased the Benz 230, then known as Benz regular.
Luckily, when this car was delivered to our house, my father was out of town so I had the opportunity to test drive before he arrived from his journey the next day and did not know I had test run it.
As you may be aware at that time, many fathers had this same Benz regular because at that time it was a kind of status symbol for the middle class men you hope to meet.
So when my friend whose father had bought the Benz regular as well heard that I was cruising my dad’s own, he drove his dad’s own to my place to check whose dad’s own was better ( you know how the matter dey be that time na).
So after the initial examination of the body shape and colour and we couldn’t find any difference we decided to do a small race to see whose father’s car was at least more powerful since the external didn’t show us any difference.
So on your marks ( both engines crank up revving ) get set and go. Halfway down the lonely first avenue road my friend’s father’s car suddenly takes a lead that I didn’t understand. The more I tried to catch up the further his own father’s Benz regular seemed to go.
So finally, finally we got to the end of the race with my own father’s car coming almost 5 seconds behind. So, what happened that I couldn’t catch up? Are they not both Benz regular?
It wasn’t until we opened the trunk of both cars that we found the answer to the different performances. Although my father’s car was the shape as my friend’s father’s car, the engines were significantly different.
My father’s car carried under its hood a four cylinder 2.3 litre engine while my friend’s father’s car although having the same Benz regular shape carried a six cylinder 2.8litre engine. No wonder we both started off together but because of what both cars carried the difference in performance couldn’t be the same.
You see we all start up in life with the same opportunities but as we move on, what would make the difference is what we carry in our inside, not what we look like on the outside
So you see, when this gubernatorial race started APC and their candidate thought that PDP and it’s candidate were the same. Afterall, they are both men and from the Esan extraction.
So INEC puts all of us on the mark, get set and go. We haven’t even gone half way like that and our candidate Dr Asue Ighodalo is already way ahead. Even if they doubted capacity before, they can’t doubt it any longer after our three local governments testing the microphone parade a few days ago.
Truth be told, the capacity of Dr Asue Ighodalo compared to that of Monday Okpebholo is like putting that AI generation beside Noah’s anti diluvian era. The difference between both of them is too massive in all ramifications and standards.
While Dr Asue Ighodalo has explored the world from his little Ewohinmi village, the other is still grappling with basic semantics and colocation of English. Dr Asue clearly has demonstrated capacity in the organized private sector as reflected on Wikipedia, the other has only an elective position to his resume on the same wikipedia.
Indeed cars may look the same way on the body but their engines are what distinguishes them. With Dr Asue Ighodalo’s education and pedigree he is no doubt a Toyota Tundra with a V8 iForce 5.7 litre engine while Monday Okpebholo is a three stroke 1.1 litre Kia picanto engine.
If two of them jam for open space, the Tundra dem go carry the picanto throw way. Can there be any basis for racing both cars at all?
Rev Olu Martins is the Deputy Director General for the Asue Ogie Campaign Management Council. He writes from his vegetable in Ekpoma Edo State
