The Change we seek II: 4 years on.

 

Hi there,

As you have figured now, I’m not a very consistent writer, at all, even though I have a lot of write ups swirling in my head.

But as with most of my other write ups, this, has been inspired by a series of recent, but in this case rather unfortunate events.

I happened to be  going through my blog for old stuff that I wrote a long time ago, mostly just to pass the free time on my hands, then I came across this article I wrote in December 2015, which I titled the change we seek?.

Well, a long time has passed since then, and my opinion on some issues there have…changed.

I have been an ardent observer of our political clime for a long time now, and this is another case of devil’s alternative playing out in front of us. Its election season again and the promises have started flying in the air. Even those that are in power are promising things they ‘will do’,

I was generally impressed with the way Nigerians banded in 2015 to dislodge in my opinion, a very incompetent incumbent. It gave the impression that we as a people are ready to take matters into our own hands, and we finally understood that we have the power to shape our destiny every four years.

In 2015 we took a gamble that hasn’t really paid off, to put it mildly. But here we are again in 2019, faced with potentially the same scenario, bar a few differences.  There are only a few things separating our two major candidates, both are northern Muslim septuagenarians. Unlike what was obtainable in ‘15, never have we been so divided along religious and ethnic lines like in 2015, when one major candidate was a Christian southerner and the other was Muslim northerner.

We’re being asked to choose between the lesser of two evils again. It seems we have not learnt anything from the experiences we had in 2015.

But yet again, it seems our young folks that have shown interest in giving us a credible alternative have thus far not shown enough, what’s the right word or phrase now, ‘political depth’

I had great hope for the so called ‘third force’ when they initially decided to come together to form PACT. Borne out of the yearning for something different, or even something to hold on to.

But from that fracas, nothing was achieved. As a matter of fact, the winner, losers and even the referee of the so called PACT have eventually gone ahead to contest for the same presidency! This decision of theirs has made it easy for me to see things from a realistic  point of view. Maybe they aren’t interested in seeing a better Nigeria, maybe they are only interested in seeing themselves as the ones who will deliver a better Nigeria.

The way the Nigerian political system is today, if you do not have grassroots structure, you can’t possibly expect to win a presidential election. This alone requires a change to the status quo on such a great scale, So I do not understand whether these ‘minority candidates are simply living in denial, or trying to make a dent so that they can upturn in 2023, or trying to boost the C.V, or biting off more than they can chew and realizing a bit late, or as some conspiracy theorist have postulated working to ensure the reelection of the incumbent. There are a million and one reasons I could think of, except the one that matters, which is actually wanting to realistically see Nigeria become a better place.

I was listening to the radio on my way to work the other day, and one of the speakers said that in his recent travels, he has been to the state of origins one of these other ‘third force’ candidates, and spoken to folks that live there. No single poster or banners, most don’t even know that their illustrious son is gunning for the top office in the country.

NIGERIA IS NOT JUST LAGOS AND ABUJA SPRINKLED WITH PORTHARCOURT AND KANO!

 This brings me to the debacle that went down at the just concluded presidential debate. The absence of one of the major candidates at the debate, and the non-participation of the other, despite already being at the venue really helped to put things into perspective that day. As I already had the premonition that both of them would find a way to wiggle out of the debate, I decided to use the time to ‘do something better’ by cheering my favorite team playing a game at that same time. That too unfortunately (for them) didn’t end well.

What does it tell you if the two most likely guys to win, didn’t participate in the debate?

It speaks to the tragic irrelevance of meaningful intellectual discourse in our political clime. It’s a vicious cycle really. They understood that their actions, or inactions will not even put a dent on their political ambition. Why? Couple of reasons I could point to actually…

Things like the high level of voter apathy amongst the educated folks, and because of the vigorous enthusiasm displayed by the average uneducated Nigerian in participating in partisan politics, are some of the reasons why we are where we are today (it’s kind of hard to pronounce actually lol).

We’ll talk about how the current political class has weaponized illiteracy and poverty to be able to keep the masses voting. But that is a story for some other time.

 It went a long way to show two things. One being that these our major candidates don’t rate us at all, and the other being  that Debates and intellectual conversations, however appealing they can be, do not win elections in Nigeria.

 For the benefit of those who don’t know, according to INEC, for you to win the presidential elections, you have to obtain

1. The highest number of vote cast AND

2.  Not less than one quarter of votes cast at the election in each of at least two-thirds of all states in the federation and in the FCT Abuja.

Why this minority candidate have conveniently chosen to ignore this, especially the second one, which emphasizes my point of political outreach is bewildering. Even the incumbent party got to where they are today as a result of an alliance.

It’s not just enough to select a vice presidential candidate from the north, like some have done. (Should take me to this issue of the principle of federal character, but that too is a topic for another day, or year)

So what’s the issue here?

Obviously these third force guys have to have some other goal for running, they confirmed that when they couldn’t band together and keep an agreement and the ‘PACT’ fell apart. Unless they are just using this to announce their presence in the political scene. Either ways.

If we are going to break  the stronghold  of these two major recycling machine parties (I believe it has become clear to us that they are not going to take us to where we want to be) despite all the challenges, the moves for 2023 needs to start happening NOW.

You’ll notice I’m not talking about the elections that are almost upon us, and that is for a good reason. Based on what is obtainable now, there is no point deceiving ourselves that there will be a paradigm shift this year. It is simply not going to happen.

To our current “coalition of 3^rd force”, WHEN you lose, don’t go to sleep, we see you (here in the major cities) we hear what you’re saying and it’s making sense. Start now to iron out your differences, and start now to be active opposition. Start now to build this grassroots’ connection which you so badly lack.

Start to build structure now, if it means putting individual and party resources together, start the coalitions and alliances with the like-minded people now. Start to pull funds now, start to build grassroots’ connections now (need to say this again for proper emphasis), and start to make your intentions known NOW. Don’t wait till the summer of 2022 to come and tell us. Give us a multitude of reasons to be solidly behind you come ’23 (not like we don’t already have enough but you get the idea).

Won’t I give whoever wins amongst the top two candidates a chance to do something, well, I did  here, look where we are now. So I’m already looking at new leadership. Our failsafe plan if/when things don’t get any better in the next four years shouldn’t be to dip into this same cesspool that has been churning out our current political class.  Our current crop of leaders are, to put it mildly, largely underperforming and underwhelming.

It’s easy to seat in the comfort (no light sha) of my home and say this and that. The groundwork is the key here. Start making moves and watch things fall in place.

 

This is my candid opinion. What’s yours?

 

Till inspiration finds me again…sayonara.

 

 

P.S. this article has been in the works for a while, the lack of current updates (things are happening so fast) is completely intentional.