The protagonists are remarkable representatives of the two sides of the Nigerian coin.
Adams Oshimhole, governor of Edo state is pitted against Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the Jonathan presidency’s Minister of Finance, whose over-bloated ego had to be thoroughly massaged with the additional title of Coordinating Minister for the Economy.
Oshiomhole is a street-wise, former leader of the Nigerian working class movement, who fought many battles on the shop floor and in the streets, against exploitative and stubborn employers of labour in the textile industry, which in its halcyon days, employed thousands of workers, especially in Northern Nigeria, where Adams cut his teeth as workers’ tribune and leader. He then led the Nigerian working people in bruising battles as a reactionary Nigerian government, especially after 1999, became wedded to the orthodoxy of neo-liberal capitalism and the notorious Washington Consensus.
