By Saintmoses Eromosele (SME)
Why Monday Okpebholo’s rise mirrors Brazil’s working-class legend
History delights in irony. The men who change nations are rarely the ones the elite predict. They are often dismissed as “unpolished,” “unlettered,” or “incapable.” Yet time has shown that greatness is not always clothed in fine grammar or gilded certificates, but in conviction, courage, and connection to the people.
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil was mocked for his limited formal education and ridiculed for his rough oratory. To the political class, he was too ordinary to lead. But it was precisely his ordinariness that made him extraordinary. Lula understood the pulse of the worker, the heartbeat of the poor, and the aspirations of the ignored. Against all odds, he rose to the presidency and reshaped Brazil — pulling millions out of poverty, expanding social welfare, and redefining the meaning of leadership.
Edo State has now found its own Lula da Silva in Senator Monday Okpebholo. Like Lula, Okpebholo’s ascent was written off by many, myself included. The propaganda was thick: he lacked polish, he lacked education, he lacked the theatrics of elite orators. But these criticisms were the very evidence of his authenticity. For leadership is not theatre; it is substance.
What Lula did for Brazil, Okpebholo is poised to do for Edo. He has already begun the quiet revolution: recalling unjustly sacked lecturers at Ambrose Alli University, reopening closed Colleges of Education and Agriculture, funding AAU back to life, giving real jobs and living wages to cleaners once exploited by billion-naira contractors, and restoring dignity to traditional rulers long disrespected. Edo Central now breathes again. Edo South hinterlands long abandoned now feel part of the state. Edo North enjoys renewed attention. Political appointments now go to politicians who understand local realities, while technocrats are rightly placed in technical roles.
And the parallel grows sharper still. Just weeks ago, Nigeria’s President Bola Ahmed Tinubu travelled to Brazil — that same Brazil once caricatured as a nation of samba, football, and poverty — now the “B” in BRICS, a power in global trade and diplomacy. This transformation did not fall from the sky; it was Lula’s legacy. If Brazil could rise from ridicule to respect, why not Edo under Okpebholo?
This is Lula’s story written in Uwessan ink. A leader derided for what he lacked, but celebrated for what he delivered. Lula lifted millions of Brazilians out of poverty; Okpebholo, if supported, can lift Edo out of the ruins of bad governance. Both prove that leadership is not the monopoly of the polished, but the heritage of the people’s choice.
It is therefore time for Edo people to close ranks, silence propaganda, and support Okpebholo’s administration as it undoes the cruelty of the past and births the New Edo. And just as Lula found continuity in progressive partnerships, we must also stand with Okpebholo in his endorsement of President Tinubu — for stability, for progress, for a Nigeria and Edo that work hand in hand.
Edo’s 2.5 million votes are not a dream. They are a possibility — if we recognize that our own Lula da Silva has arrived, not in faraway Brasília, but here, in Benin.
Saintmoses Eromosele (SME) writes from his Cassava farms in Eidenu and Ewu
