The Evil Men Do Lives After Them – by James Hadley Chase

Column by
Emmanuel Oluwaseun

Council for Justice & Equity
Ondo State Chapter

This country of ours has lost its reading culture. I’m sure I’m not the first to make that observation, but I feel it live and direct right now. In the seventies and early eighties, as secondary school students we were fully subscribed to reading for leisure and it was standard practice and peer competition to finish a novel from cover to cover, within just one or two days. My favourite author in those times was James Hadley Chase who wrote fiction that engaged the reader from start to finish. 

I still remember my very first of his books, “The Vulture is a Patient Bird”, but the one that vividly stands out in my mind was the one entitled, “The Evil Men Do Lives After Them”. Although these novels were pure fiction, to a large extent many of the stories and experiences shaped the lives of the reader for many decades, perhaps because in reality they were a portrayal of life.

Four decades later and the echoes of the past still ring true in 2020. A man that soils his hands in the murky waters of evil trespassing may have a temporary reprieve that meets the immediate contingency, but eventually those evil deeds of the past are bound to catch up with him. Some call it the Law of Karma, others say it’s “as you lay your bed that you lie on it”.

Just one man has to born in 1968 in order to secure employment opportunities and his elected position as a member Federal House of Representatives (not too young). Yet the same one man by a sworn Affidavit in a court of law, has to be born in 1980 in order to justify the WAEC school result that was presented as certification of his eligibility on grounds of the minimum academic requirement (not too old). It is reported that he didn’t even write the examinations himself, some person or persons stood-in for him. This is the crux of the Age Falsification allegations against just one man, so, when was he really born?

Just one man was a full-time member of the House of Representatives between 2007 to 2011 and this same one man was a full-time student at the Igbinedion University studying Law and went on to complete the full-time Law School programme, bore his call to Nigerian Bar in 2010, simultaneously. Is it humanly possible to be Full-Time in two establishments at the same time, especially given that one is located in Abuja, FCT and the other in Edo State? And to then give false testimony in a court of law under oath is the crux of the Perjury allegations against just one man.

Today, some people say it’s an unnecessary witch-hunt just because the man wants to fulfil a personal ambition of becoming Governor of Ondo State. Others will tell you that these worms of fictitious machinations are coming out of the woodwork because he is a popular candidate in the forthcoming electoral process. Let us face up to the reality that, the evil men do doesn’t just live after them it follows them like a shadow until the truth prevails, either during their lifetime or even after death.

We have absolutely nothing against this one man, but don’t’ you think it’s time for us to call a spade a spade and advise this one man to clear his otherwise butchered and tattered personal profile before resuming this lofty ambitious governorship pursuit, at the very least? In civilized climes, there is enough baggage & garbage lingering in his closet to disqualify him from participation, but sadly in this nation, almost anything goes. We contend that this situation is unacceptable in an enlightened state like Ondo and demand in express terms that now is the time for positive reforms.