Dear Abba Kyari: The day you met me, showed me your are not a monster

Dear Abba Kyari,

Rest in peace. I never got to write you a letter while you were alive. Despite how prominent you were believed to be in the present administration. Shame on me.

And I call myself the Social Media Editor. The Mailer. The Ink Shooting Minister. I failed. Good thing is, motivational speakers have thought us not to be afraid or ashame of failing.

But…

Ediale never wrote a Dear Kyari.

Not so good.

But we move. We ask that you rest in peace even as we move.

Feyi Fawehinmi an accountant, amateur economist, wannabe photographer, that tweets @doubleeph, wrote a letter for you.

I spotted it and represent below:

***

The death of Abba Kyari greatly saddens me. He was one of the Nigerian government officials I abused the most here. Until one fine day last December.

I was driving when a call came in.

“Hello, is that Feyi?”

Yes

“This is Abba Kyari. I’ll like to meet you and show you I’m not a monster”.

About a week later, I drove down to cambridge to meet him. I took 2 books for him and he also brought 2 books for me. (The books exchanged are in the comment section). We spent close to 2 hours talking about everything in Nigeria from Buhari to 2nd Niger Bridge.

I assumed it would be like the usual Nigerian big men you meet and never hear from once they return to Nigeria. But we continued chatting daily and even when he landed in Abuja, he sent a message from the airport saying we should keep in touch.

Since then we’ve chatted very regularly until the last 2 weeks when his illness took a turn for the worse. Sometimes light capitalism vs socialism banter. Sometimes more serious stuff.

If you call me a hypocrite I will accept the charge. But I confess that I had started to like the man. It may be that I fell for the old trick of a powerful person treating you with respect but I always found him to be courteous and quite different from the image I had of him.

This is not an image washing exercise – many people dislike him strongly (I was one of them too not long ago).

But hearing the news of his death has left me deeply deeply sad. And I pray that God grants his soul eternal rest and comfort his family.

***

There.

I have always also understood how human these guys most people paint as demons could also be as charming as they come.

Kyari, you had a fam. I am sure they saw you differently.

You are said to have died a mu’meen, a martyr (shaheedi) because your death is from a pandemic. And also there’s a significant of also departing on a Friday. Yeah, muslim cleric says some bonus comes with these situation. That it is a beautiful way to die. He ends his words with, “May Allah accept his shahada, forgive his shortcomings and grant him jannatul Firdaus”.

Death.

It is the final silencer.

What does it profit anyone to gloat over your death?

Your RIP spotter,
Ediale.
#ForTheCulture

PS: I have always seriously joked that we may never know how it’s best for you to be in charge. How you just could be actually way better than the one we voted for.

RIP.