Peace not War! ( First published 05/07/2009)

The doctrine of Separation of Powers is one of the better tenets of modern democracy. This, in effect, means that the actions of the executive arm of the government are subject to checks by the legislative arm leaving the judiciary to serve as the ultimate arbiter.In light of this supposition, one can reasonably conclude that the hyped-up stand-off between the Executive and the Legislature in Ogun State is nothing but democracy in action, so why so much hulla-balloo? There cannot be an effective check and balancing if the two arms of government are too pally!It is the essential duty of the Executive to come up with huge budgetary proposals and it is equally the duty of the Legislature to check the proposals for accountability. There is absolutely no crime committed on either side, it is just a normal political process.What is not normal, and somehow disheartening, are the personal attacks and negative press being concocted by some overzealous supporters of both sides. The Executives and the Legislators are all paid employees of the State and it is exactly this sort of legitimate arguments, believe it or not, that they are paid to iron out purposefully. I would, in fact, be truly alarmed if this were not the case.The main culprits in this whole fracas then, as far as I can see, are the poison-happy writers who seem to thrive on sensationalism and apparently think to some degree that 'patriotism' is the same thing as 'activism' (Apology to Omo Omo). For the records, even though I have some admiration for the so-called G-15 and immense respect for the office of the Governor, I share none of their political beliefs and would rather see all of them replaced by a new order of morally upright individuals. However, as patriots, we are morally bound to support the government of the day no matter how undesirable we may think they are and no matter our own individual political bias. And since the government consists of not only the Executive but also the Legislature as well, then we ought to support all the parties (Pardon my pun). Meanwhile, my firm suggestion is that agents of the Governor should stop personal attacks of any kind on members of the legislature while agents of the G15 should also stop demonising the Governor. What we need in Ogun State is peace not war! God bless our motherland.