KOGI 2027: THE IMAGINATION OF WRITER
In this report, Stanley Ajileye imagines the making and execution of the Lugard House conspiracy that Faleke foiled.
On Saturday morning, January 17, Rt. Hon. (Dr.) James Abiodun Faleke woke up before dawn at his Lagos farm. He does this often. The farm, unlike Abuja or Lagos politics, does not ring endlessly, does not plot, and does not leak stories to bloggers. It is one of the few places where Faleke can reduce distractions and attend to files that actually grow something tangible, cassava, maize, and peace of mind.
The National Assembly was on recess, and the farm had patiently waited its turn. Since returning from a medical trip abroad, where he underwent a minor surgical procedure on his arm tendon, Faleke had hardly enjoyed a real break. Party assignments had eaten deep into his supposed holidays. The farm files had piled up like unpaid political debts.
Before getting out of bed, he reached for one of the two phones on the bedside stool. It was a few minutes to 6.00 a.m. He smiled. He had slept before midnight, an unusual luxury. Then he saw it. 462 missed and attempted calls.
Telecommunication around the farm is poor, a frustration he hopes will someday be resolved. But this time, the silence was deliberate. He had muted the world.
Elsewhere on the farm, his younger brother, Bola, woke up to a far louder disturbance, social media. According to reports trending overnight, his brother had attended a secret, late night meeting at the Presidential Villa over the Kogi governorship. Present at this imagined gathering were Alhaji Yahaya Bello, Governor Usman Ododo, Hon. James Faleke himself, “Hon. Dan Okolo, former commissioner and one time ambassador,” and other unnamed but conveniently “critical stakeholders loyal to Governor Ododo.”
Bola laughed. In his characteristic jovial manner, he jumped out of bed and muttered, “Boda must be another Spider Man. Let me check his room whether he has returned from Abuja.”
He walked to Faleke’s room. Before knocking, he heard him praying. Bola quietly retreated, forwarded the report to his brother on WhatsApp, and added a message,
“Honourable Spider Man, welcome back from Abuja.”
Faleke would see it. Bola’s number was one of the three pinned on his WhatsApp. It will come on the top of other messages.
Minutes later, Faleke walked into Bola’s room, smiling.
“Good morning sir,” Bola greeted, quickly asking whether the Honourable had brought back the dark sun shade he forgot in Abuja weeks earlier. They both laughed.
While laughter echoed on a Lagos farm, tension was thick in Kogi State.
That night before in Lokoja, Friday, January 16, a little past 6.00 p.m. A select group of men, those Governor Usman Ododo fondly refers to as his “effective cabal,” were gathered. These were not ordinary political actors. These were men who believed power could be edited, scheduled, and uploaded.
They had reached a conclusion, the Faleke problem had to be solved.
In recent weeks, the growing popularity of James Abiodun Faleke, member representing Ikeja Federal Constituency, and the increasing calls for him to contest the Kogi governorship had unsettled Lugard House. Propaganda had failed. Manufactured endorsements had collapsed. Security and unity meetings, real and imagined, had fallen apart like poorly bound exercise books.
Then someone had an idea.
If they could not stop Faleke, they would break him away from the President.
They reasoned that Faleke would never venture into Kogi politics without the goodwill of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. So the plan was simple, make the Presidency angry with him. Paint him as reckless. Portray him as abusing privilege. Accuse him of signing a non existent agreement with Yahaya Bello and Ododo. Drag the President’s name into a meeting he never authorised.
Timing was everything.
The President was away in Turkey on a state visit. A weekend would ensure fewer hands around the Villa to confirm or deny anything. The imagination factory went into full production.
Back at Lugard House, anxiety grew. The chief cabal paced the room. Sweat betrayed confidence.
“Put on the air conditioner,” he barked.
“It has been on,” he was told.
“Put it on the highest level.”
“It’s already there.”
A bottle of special wine appeared. He opened it but did not pour. He dropped it beside a white file jacket on the table.
Then the hatchet man arrived, late but thorough. He refused to use familiar bloggers. That would be suicidal. Instead, a blogger in far away Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, would do the job.
“Bayelsa is far from Kogi,” someone smiled.
The stories were prepared, two of them.
One announcing a meeting.
Another explaining the “outcome.”
Moles were activated to circulate the links. Names were dropped casually. Confidence was high.
The first red flag for Faleke’s supporters was simple logic. The schedule did not align. The cast list made no sense. How could a man sleeping on a Lagos farm be holding meetings in Abuja at the same time?
Teleportation exists only in comic books and in Lugard House imagination.
When Faleke finally read the messages flooding his phone, friends advised him to ignore the story. But something within him disagreed. Silence, in this case, would fertilise falsehood.
He issued a rebuttal.
There was no agreement.
There was no meeting.
There was no permission required from Yahaya Bello or Governor Ododo.
Service to Kogi State is not a clandestine contract.
A sitting governor, Faleke knew, can be unseated without any secret handshake. His call to serve Kogi was neither rented nor borrowed. It was not subject to the approval of any cabal.
He took to his social media and dismantled the story calmly, firmly, and completely.
A cat, after all, is never at the mercy of a mouse.
By the time Lugard House realised the script had failed, the damage had reversed. The conspiracy collapsed under the weight of its own imagination.
The dice was cast.
And Faleke went back to his farm files, real work, real soil, real politics.
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(DEMOCRACY NEWSLINE NEWSPAPER, JANUARY 30TH 2026)
