Watching him from close quarter holding' court in his father's residence last week, Senator Bukola Saraki was in his element as a true blue blood. Last week Friday, the sedate ambience of his Hoffa Road residence, GRA, Ilorin witnessed such an explosion of enthusiasm on the occasion of a reception he hosted to welcome the immediate past National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alha]i Kawu Baraje back to the famed great hall.

The reception which he described as symbolic was hosted to welcome him back to his root in politics.

"This is history because we are back to the same compound where we resumed as Governor in 2003. I was operating from this compound because Government House was still under renovation. This was the office of Alhaji Kawu Baraje as my Permanent Secretary. And we are still back in the same compound where we started from", Saraki recalled.

By this, Senator Saraki left no one in doubt about the symbolic role the Great Hall plays in the making of leaders in Kwara's politics.

He might also have used the occasion to try to tell others to come to the Great Hall if the want to achieve success in the state's politics. Listen further to him.

"This is a lesson to all of you who are here. Anybody among you can rise to the top, but you have to learn from Kawu Baraje. I thank my former colleagues who stood by me to produce Baraje as first, the National Secretary and then. National Chairman of the party despite the challenges I faced on this.

"And Baraje himself was also humble and loyal to me even agains all odds. If not for his loyalty, things would have been different because he often told our critics then that 'it is either you take me away with my leader because you cannot take him away and leave me behind'.

"This is a difficult challenge because 1 know how difficult his situation was as a human being in this kind of dilemma. I want to tell all of you here that it is possible to get to the top and still remain loyal to the tradition that produced you.

"He got to the top and did not use the position to fight me. He has gone and come back the same person he was before he got to the top. This is a challenge to all of you here". It was the most graphic and intimate statement from Saraki about the role the Great Hall plays in Kwara politics in recent time.

Earlier on at the Ilorin International Airport, where party men and women had converged to welcome back the former PDP Acting National Chairman, a mild drama ensued. The Secretary to the Kwara State Government, Alhaji IsiakaGold has led other top government functionaries to the airport to receive Alhaji Baraje on behalf of Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed and to bring him straight to the Government House.

He had told the politicians who had been waiting for the arrival of Alhaji Baraje and Senator Saraki that he was instructed to bring Baraje to the Government House. But Alhaji Kayode Maja told him straight "Well, we are not going to fight you on that. You can do whateveryou like with him. But after that we are bringing him back to the Great Hall because that is where He belongs. He needs to be hosted by our leader, Senator Bukola Saraki".

From the airport, the well wishers who had come to welcome Alhaji Baraje home proceeded in a carnival-like procession to the Government House, after he had arrived with Senator Bukola Saraki from Abuja with a chartered aircraft (M-Anga) at 11:30am.
His homecoming reception organized by the Kwara State government to honour him had all the trappings of carnival show.

Band boys, drums and beaded gourds known as "sekere" in the Yoruba musical sphere, in addition to a number of other instruments of music combined to provide agglomeration of sounds that swung the peoples' mood.

It was a historic show stopper with all the stops and stumps pulled out to herald him home.

Before the train that heralded Baraje to Government House returned to lloffa Road, politicians had gathered at lloffa Road residence of Senator Saraki waiting with him for the arrival of Baraje.

Strange is the fact that the Senator who by any stretch of the imagination could not be described as having the gift of the garb easily whipped his followers into a frenzy, not by any delicately wrought word or uplifting phrases nor by any calculated soapbox theatrics like politicians of the older generations, yet they swooned on him at any slight show of body language from him.

Like the Lord of the Manor, he had a vicelike grip on them the way they pay him obeisance or to attract his attention.

It was reminiscent of the older Saraki when he still called the shots. When Alhaji Baraje arrived with members of his immediate family, the entire compound and its neighbourhoods heaved and pulsated convulsively.

It was a carnival of the hoi polloi (the ordinary); party bigwigs, its rank and file, government officials, families and friends with a battery of area boys forming a rowdy guard of honour.

"The leader! Sai Bukola! Sai Baraje! Sai Ahmed!" were noises that intermittently rent the air. This was the stuff politics is made up of in Kwara. And it shows that Great Hall at lloffa Road is still the cauldron of politics in the state despite the fact that the older Saraki no longer calls the shot and notwithstanding the fact that his scion who has stepped into his shoes has ceased to be governor.

Then, what made the lloffa Road a Mecca of sort for politicians seeking public appointments in the state and Nigeria or other favours? Or what made it thick as nursery bed of political career in Kwara?

The record shows that it was the leadership quality of the older Saraki that made it a Mecca for people from near and far who sought a career in politics.

For example, the man had made many political leaders through public appointments at all levels of public service, either governors, ministers; ambassadors; commissioners local government chairmen etc.

Also, apart from his natural chemistry with people that made them to love to follow him even at the risk of their lives, his legendary generosity equally contributed to the making of his lloffa residence as Mecca to politicians and non-politicians alike.

At the height of his glory, the man became awe-inspiring, deified and was held in mystical fear by his people
because of his exploits. These included making live governors and removal ol'tvvo of them. I le also waged a lot of battles with many of his proteges who turned his mortal foes or the non politicians who just loved to hate him.

While a few of them died fighting him, others who did not practically became irrelevant. Yet he achieved all these without holding the rein of power i.e. he was neither a president nor a governor when he survived all these.

Also bestriding Kwara's political scene like a colossus just like his father, his son, Senator Bukola Saraki who has stepped into his shoes is also making leaders like his fathers. But how far can he go like his lather?
The problem with this kind of leadership is that it is only charismatic and non institutional which explains its transient and fleeting nature unlike the traditional leadership.

But this is not to say that it cannot be institutionalised if there were conscious efforts to make it so. This is the area where German Sociologist, Max Weber made an indepth study of and offered solutions.

Perhaps the younger Saraki might be disposed to institutionalise his father's legacy symbolized by his lloffa Road residence which was "described by Baraje during his response to his reception as "Sarakite school of politics"
which he said 'produced him and others.

Listen to Baraje "I thank God today for the gift of human being for which Kwarans are made up of. These are people who had come to welcome me home from the airport. I thank our Governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed who had deemed it fit to organize this reception forme. I also thank our leader, Senator Bukola Saraki, a leader who is fishing out other leaders in Kwara State today.

"I also thank the doyen of Abubakar Olusola Saraki for giving us his life and time and son in Kwara. I thank all our party leaders for sticking and staying with the Sarakite politics. We are all products of the Saraki's school of politics.

"1 remember that my sojourn in politics started in 2003. Senator Bukola Saraki made me a permanent secretary in this compound from where we started operating.

"He attached me to his father in 2005 who made me go through his school of politics in order to groom me. In 2009, Senator Bukola Saraki took me to all that matter in PDF at the national level, telling them confidently that this is my product, accept him and succeed or reject him and regret.

"He made me what I am today. Wherever and whenever I am speaking, it is Senator Bukola Saraki, my leader that is speaking. Kwarans, I congratulate you today that God has given you an inestimate jewel of leader in politics in Saraki's family. Hold steadfast to it".

By Adeleke Gbenga (The Herald)