ON January 19, 2015, Nigerians woke up to a scandalous advertorial splashed across the front pages of two national dailies with texts and images suggesting that Muhammadu Buhari, then presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, would die in office if elected president. The advertorial, which had the pictures of Murtala Muhammed, Sani Abacha and Umaru Yar’Adua, all of whom died in office, was accompanied by the following words: “Nigerians be warned! Nigeria…I have set before thee Life and death. Therefore, choose life that both thee and thy seed may live.” Evil and completely senseless, the advertorial was placed by Ayodele Fayose, then governor of Ekiti State. As outrage grew across the polity, Femi Adesina, Editor-in-Chief of The Sun, one of the two dailies that had carried the advertorial and whose editorial work had significantly toned down the unhinged message Fayose had intended to purvey, told a shell-shocked populace: “If you see the original of that advert, you would still then have to commend the media.” Before this advert, the poster boy for indecorum had made many provocative statements but even his party, the PDP, had to disown the statement suggesting that anyone elected president from the North-West was only a walking corpse. As a candidate, Buhari had a bleak record that should have locked him permanently out of Aso Rock, but Fayose did not highlight them in his bilious campaign that ended up getting him (Buhari) there. Needless to say, the Daura Deceiver did not die in office.

If there was a prize for indecorum in and out of office, that prize would definitely be won by Fayose, arguably the vilest individual carrying the tag of ex-governor in Nigeria today. Imagine a former governor who is worth nothing in the estimation of decent people, and you will inevitably come to the asise (error) called Fayose. Fayose is not just crude and uncouth, he actively portrays the picture of a man without active control of his faculties. He comes across as a completely shameless errand boy, an absolute trainwreck of a personality who is Ekiti State’s biggest de-marketer on the national/global stage, and who should never have been elected governor — or, for that matter, allowed access to any public office henceforth.

In his Makinde Derangement Syndrome (MADS), Fayose has made many provocative statements designed to incite the people of Oyo State to violence against their governor and to plunge the state into utter chaos, and has grown progressively worse simply because the people have chosen to ignore him, knowing that he is an attention-seeking buffoon. That, apparently, was why he had the temerity to say that Governor Seyi Makinde orchestrated the abduction of pupils and teachers in Oriire, Oyo State, to embarrass President Bola Tinubu! In other words, Makinde paid terrorists to abduct the teachers and students who are currently in captivity, and had one of the teachers beheaded just to embarrass the Presidency! And I ask: what exactly is Fayose’s mission in Oyo State? Does he want to plunge Oyo State into chaos and enslave the people, like his lord and saviour, the minister of chaos, has done in Rivers State? Why is Fayose mocking the Oriire victims while rescue efforts are ongoing? Who sent Fayose on his dirty errands in Oyo State, and why?

Months ago, Fayose claimed that Governor Makinde received ₦50 billion from President Bola Tinubu following the 2024 Bodija explosion but gave only N4.5bn to the victims while expending the rest on his political ambition. As I wrote in “Ayodele Fayose, do you earn interest on your current account?” (January 3, 2026): “Fayose acted like a career clown: he released an internal memo requesting funds, equating it with evidence of disbursement…Following Fayose’s allegation, the Oyo State Government issued a powerful statement indicating that while it had indeed received N30 billion from the Federal Government on November 4, 2024, which is ten clear months after the incident, it had refrained from touching the money because the remaining N20 billion had been withheld by federal agencies without explanation. It also released a bank statement validating its claim. But more importantly, it showed that the N24bn interventions carried out in Bodija were done at its own expense.”

Today, Fayose’s sympathisers claim that his Bodija allegation was true, but they have supplied zero evidence. In sheer buffoonery, they claim that the Oyo State Government should have made a public announcement indicating that it had received the promised funds. State governments, including the Lagos State government which got N100 million, do NOT typically announce the receipt of funds from the Federal Government, but the critics ignored that fact in their bid to demonize Makinde and celebrate Fayose for purely partisan reasons.

In order to plunge Oyo State into chaos, Fayose alleged that Makinde was plotting to dethrone the Olubadan of Ibadanland, Oba Rashidi Ladoja, himself a former governor of the state. He provided no evidence, but a popular musician was to call Governor Makinde’s supporters bastards afterwards. On another occasion, the depraved ex-governor alleged that Makinde lacked the courage to meet President Tinubu alone and had to rely on another governor during a Presidential Villa meeting. He gave no evidence. And on yet another occasion, he alleged that Makinde had effectively “hijacked” Oyo land allocations. Again, he provided no evidence.

 The only ex-governor who gossips like a jobless housewife, Fayose went to great lengths in February to detail the outcome of a meeting between the Oyo governor and ex-VP Atiku. Fayose did not attend the meeting but he prattled on and on about it, supplying details from his corrupt imagination. Here is a news report written by Kazeem Ugbodaga of PM News: “A former Governor of Ekiti State, Ayodele Fayose, has alleged details of a high-level political meeting between former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde, claiming discussions centred on a potential presidential ticket under the African Democratic Congress (ADC). In a statement shared via his verified X handle on Wednesday, Fayose said the Minna meeting was strategically arranged, with the ‘venue and personalities involved carefully chosen so as to ensure confidence and acceptability.’ He claimed that political calculations around zoning and regional acceptability shaped the talks.”

If you are looking for a character who talks like a regular dunce, who is pedestrian in thinking, warped in character, hell-dark in soul, and cuts the image of a ruffian, look no further than the ex-governor from Ekiti. He is Nigeria’s most uncultured politician. He is a barefaced liar but as Abraham Lincoln once said: “No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar.”

The Oyo State government is apparently abiding by Francis Bacon’s dictum that “Calumnies are answered best with silence,” but it is time to make Fayose face the wrath of the law. He can’t keep inciting the people to violence. If the streets of Oyo State erupt in the violence that Fayose is inciting, he will flee to Ekiti State, where he will become terminal cancer. It is time to prosecute him for his crimes.